Chiaroscuro
by boomvroomshroom
Summary: "They say the only thing to fear is fear itself. That, and a motivated Nara." Shikamaru is born with his father's intelligence and his mother's work ethic. The world is turned sideways.
1. Prologue

**CHIAROSCURO**

 _"They say the only thing to fear is fear itself. That, and a motivated Nara."_

* * *

chi·a·ro·scu·ro (pronunciation: kēˌärəˈsk(y)o͝orō,kēˌarə-/)

 _noun_

1\. The treatment of light and shade in drawing and painting; an effect of contrasted light and shadow created by light falling unevenly or from a particular direction on something.

2\. The juxtaposition of light and darkness or shadow.

plural noun: **chiaroscuros**

"the chiaroscuro of cobbled streets"

* * *

"Shikaku! Why are you always like this?"

"Like what?"

"You _know_ what I'm talking about, Shikaku! Lazy – lazy – _lazy_! I'm willing to put up with _your_ limp-sack-of-meal attitude, but I will _NOT_ allow you to impede Shikamaru in the same way!"

"I would _never_ block Shikamaru from – "

"Then _why_ are you so against his – "

My father shot out of his chair, his warped, twisting shadow towering over my mother and stretching across the whole kitchen, and for once, my mother, who I had always regarded as the more forceful of the two, was at a loss for words.

I had never seen him look so angry before. Hell, I had _never_ even _seen_ him angry in _any_ manner before, _ever_. Annoyed, yes – but the only indication he ever gave to being annoyed was just to shove a pillow over his own head and roll over. That, I could deal with.

But this man was something else entirely, something I could not, for all my expanded six-year-old vocabulary, figure out how to describe. What I _did_ know was that this being was clearly dangerous – and at that moment, my apparently "genius" mind finally grasped the true meaning of a shinobi. Somewhere underneath his sleepy attitude, the man who had killed his way to survival through a whole entire shinobi world war was finally resurfacing, scars and all. The deep streak running down his face, the lumpy layer of skin that I always used to have fun poking at as a baby while he chuckled – that was nothing compared to the scores of pain that radiated from his eyes now.

I had never been so scared in all my six-year-old life.

One thing was for sure – I knew from that point on, that while I could anger my mother all I wanted and get away with little more than a relatively painless scolding and a few minutes in the corner, driving my father to _his_ breaking point was a very unwise course of action and most likely the last one I would ever take.

There were things to be said about the fury of a patient man.

My mother's face was frozen, pale white against the flickering lamp; she could not speak. I was still hiding behind the wall separating the kitchen from the living room. They had not noticed me yet; my parents were so caught up in their argument, and anyway, I was a Nara. Unlike most children, I was not afraid of the darkness – rather, I loved it for the cover and peacefulness it could provide. I was prone to a disposition of the shadows, and I had always been good at hiding. Besides that, I was so small already, even compared to other children my age, and my chakra reserves were still so little, that it was likely my presence had faded in with the increasingly flaring aura of my father's. With every word he spoke, his anger became greater, and so the dark cloud of energy around him grew, working himself into a frenzy that I never thought he was capable of.

My father – such a solemn, quiet, calm man – and this person in our kitchen right now, yelling at my mother – could not possibly be the same person…

And yet he was.

The pictures on our family shrine were rattling alongside his rumbling voice and glowing chakra now. I imagined my two-dimensional family ancestors with their glossy photographed eyes behind the glass panes and carven frames shaking with just as much terror as I was.

If Father could hear their trembling over the sound of his own yelling, he didn't seem to care.

"The three Sannin – one a wayward pervert, one a hedonistic drunk, and one in Kami knows where, rendered so completely inhuman by his own genius!" With each sentence, his voice rose exponentially. "The Fourth Hokage – praise – greatness – bestowed with so many nicknames and titles he'd drown in ink writing them all down! And for what? Dead before he even hit thirty!" He just kept going and going and going and would not stop. "Kakashi Hatake – so completely screwed up in the head that it's not even funny – and _don't give me that look, Yoshino, you and I both know that it's true_ , that that poor man _is_ the _worst_ head case _anyone_ who knows _anything_ about psychology will _ever_ see short of insanity itself – who wouldn't be when you've spent your whole life since you could walk risking your life for a village that only saw to smash everything and everyone you've ever cared about to pieces – that's why he wears ten masks on top of each other and evades every personal question like oil evades water and reads that _Icha Icha_ filth in public and purposely arrives late to _everything_ and spends _hours and hours upon hours_ standing outside in the sun, the rain, the snow, whatever in front of that accursed stone, and fucks around with people's minds like he doesn't even care every chance he gets, because it's such an obvious _coping mechanism_ to deal with all the shit life has dealt him, and no one, not even Inoichi _Yamanaka_ , can do _anything_ about it!"

My mother didn't cry. She was a brave, hardened woman, not like the soft little princesses in stories. She had never waited for any man to come and rescue her. Everything she had ever accomplished, from her first mission to grabbing my father's attention, had been entirely of her own merit.

So why was there all this water running down her cheeks now?

"Shikaku, please – "

My father did not hear her, and just kept mercilessly listing every single predecessor of the Konoha Prodigies Legacy, until, finally, he punctuated his argument with such a great volume that I wondered why the whole village hadn't awoken and come by our house to see what was going on already.

Maybe it was because they knew that when the noise was coming from Shikaku Nara's home of all places, it was best to stay away.

"Do you _want_ me to get started on the brilliant, undefeatable, infamous Itachi Uchiha – genin at seven, chunin at eight, and already murdering grown men in their beds as an ANBU captain when he was but thirteen? Completely snapped and gone mad, leaving his beloved younger brother to pick up the pieces! But I suppose we shouldn't be _surprised_ , oh, no, send a little kid out to snap his first neck and slice his first jugulars before his age has even exited the single digits; everything will be fine, won't it? I'm surprised he didn't try pulling some stunt like this earlier! Just think, Yoshino! His entire family, the largest clan in all of Konoha, _MURDERED_ , _SLAUGHTERED_ in cold blood, reduced from over a hundred men to only two, in _ONE_ night! _I WAS THERE,_ YOSHINO! I WAS ONE OF THE ORIGINAL PEOPLE CALLED IN FOR THE INITIAL INVESTIGATION AFTER THE UCHIHA MASSACRE WAS OVER, AND _DO YOU KNOW WHAT I SAW?_ AN ENTIRE _WATERFALL_ OF BLOOD, RUNNING DOWN THE FRONT STEPS AND SPILLING OUT INTO THE BOULEVARD BEYOND! AND YOU KNOW WHAT _ELSE_ I SAW? ITACHI UCHIHA'S FOOTPRINTS IN THE SEA OF RED! AND NOT A SINGLE ONE WAS SMUDGED OR POOLED! HE DID NOT HESITATE NOR DID HE RUN OUT OF THERE! HE _WALKED_ CALMLY AND COOLLY AS ONE MIGHT STROLL THROUGH THE PARK ON A HAPPY AND BRIGHT SUMMER'S DAY AS IF NOTHING WAS WRONG – "

"Shikaku!"

And then the anger broke, and the beast was gone, replaced by a man seemingly too old to be my grandfather. Aged, not only with wisdom, but with pain…

His yelling had ceased, replaced with something slow and sorrowful instead. And yet it was these sentiments, born, once again, of a beast different from my father this time, another beast of fear rather than anger, that terrified me more than any of his fury. Even years from now, when I would be confronted with enemies, my memory would revert to this one moment, and I would remember his painful sighs…

"Oh, what next, Yoshino? What fate are we to assign this next one? Shall we make him Shikamaru Nara, the boogeyman himself? The cautionary tale to all future generations of our clan, about he who treaded in the shadows for so long that he ended up becoming one of them himself?"

My mother did not say a word. I did not, either. I simply sat frozen, unable to even breathe, as I watched the dark silhouettes on the wall curl into a most familiar shape.

Me.

* * *

Let me explain my story from the beginning.

My name is Shikamaru Nara, as you may have deduced. I am the son of Shikaku Nara and Yoshino Nara, formerly Yoshino -, of an insignificant bloodline, and heir to the Nara clan of Konohagakure no Sato. I am an only child, though I probably have some distant cousins from my mother's side living elsewhere. I won't be speaking of them much, which I think will suit them well, as they are civilians who would prefer a peaceful and quiet life far away from all the treachery and cruelties of the shinobi sphere. I do not blame them for this take on life, and I don't think they will be very offended at me, either, when I say that I consider my comrades-at-arms more of my brothers and sisters than blood will ever be.

Blood traits seem to run strongly in shinobi families. Take me, for instance. At first glance I am exactly like my father. The spiky, dark hair, the lazy, hooded eyes, the shapes of our faces and noses, the facial expressions we make in every situation, the uncanny intelligence only befitting of a Nara – even our usual habits, from how we yawn to the way we tend to roll our eyes in exasperation, coincide exactly, though that might be more due to how I was raised (children, after all, do imitate their parents) than genetics.

But for the Academy teachers who were unfortunate enough to suffer through more than one generation of my family, aunts and uncles and distant cousins included, they will tell you right away that in my heart I am my mother.

It is said (sometimes affectionately, and sometimes in complaint) that the Nara suffer an affliction of too much _yin_. From our minds to our bodies, and even in the signature shadow techniques that we use, we are the quiet, pondering types; intelligent, but not prone to action. _Too_ intelligent, perhaps, and so Nature had to balance out the playing field by reducing something else of ours.

At least, that was how it was, until I came along.

Hokage-sama blames my mother. He never says it out loud, but I can tell, because every time my father decides to participate in Konoha Command Central's "Take Your Child to Work Day", the Sandaime will furrow his old brows and pinch the bridge of his nose and sigh a quiet _"Oh, Shikaku, why did you marry_ her _of all people?"_ each time he lays his eyes on me.

Of course, it was said in jest, not actual anger, so maybe I shouldn't complain so much.

My mother was not a Nara by birth, although she definitely looks the part – she, too, has that rather oval face so prominently displayed when her hair is pulled back. But that is neither here or there. She came from a civilian family – perhaps I had a grandfather who was a Genin on her side; I do not know – and thus she had had to fight and claw and scream her way up to her rank as Chunin, among the rest of her average peers, unlike those "special" teams composed solely of clan children (speaking of which, pretty much every heir to every clan that matters happens to be in my year…). She probably could have made it further, but then I was born, and so she retired.

That is, on paper. In spirit she has always remained a shinobi, and every morning without fail she proves it by faithfully dragging me out of bed at the crack of dawn to do our exercises. (She gave up on trying to get my father to wake up that early long ago, because by the time she finally manages to get him out of bed the allotted time is already over anyway. Although, she still nags at him once he's finally awake.)

Had I been my father, she would have given up on both of us.

But I was not like my father. I was my mother, and for once, the _yin_ of the Nara were balanced out with the _yang_ of my mother – new, fresh blood, born from the natural social injustice of the established clan system, bred out of nothing but sheer will and determination, hot and eager and ready for action. Yes, I was born with my father's brain, but I had my mother's heart, a heart carved out from the trials and tribulations, not only of shinobi life, but of the shinobi political world in general, with little more than an average instructor, a mediocre family name, and all of her courage and fierceness.

I started the Academy at the age of six or so, just like everyone else in my year. And at first, the difference between my classmates and me hadn't really been that bad or obvious. The first few days were mostly theory, so the civilian-born children at least wouldn't kill themselves when they finally tried to pick up a kunai the wrong way, so I didn't have much opportunity for demonstration other than answering basic questions. Sure, I got them right, but so did most of the other kids who had bothered to crack open a textbook the day before. Even one of the civilian-born girls - Sakura Haruno - could answer those types of questions perfectly.

Even after the basic training finally started, I seemed perfectly normal compared to the other clan children. Sure, thanks to my practice sessions with my mother, I could throw my weapons and execute all my katas perfectly, and rank relatively high in spars, but that was to be expected from someone of my background. There were many other students, like my friends Ino Yamanaka and Choji Akimichi, who had also received clan upbringings and therefore did just as well.

Our class that year had had the most number of clan children for a long time, and all of us happened to be clan heirs. Something like this must have been planned, since to me there was no way this could happen at random, but I said nothing since it was a useless fact anyway, and my father always told me to never waste time on useless facts.

The point was, for the first few weeks, there was very little to distinguish me from the rest of my classmates, especially since a third of the class was working with the same advantages I had. In fact, had it not been known that I was a Nara who _didn't_ spend half the day napping, I would have been one of the less significant clan heirs, classified right in that same group that Shino Aburame was in, given that there existed kids like Sasuke Uchiha and Kiba Inuzaka, both of whom were much more prone to showing off than I was.

But I couldn't hide forever. Though my father had tried his hardest to instill in me a strong sense of modesty – mostly through the doctrine that good shinobi should neither be seen nor heard – my mother had sort of cancelled that and ideal out with her own doctrine – of always trying your best and giving everything your all.

Given my natural-born intelligence, that meant I had a lot to give.

In the end, that had ended up manifesting itself in a compromise. I never volunteered to do more than was asked of me, unlike Sasuke who took to demonstrating complicated taijutsu takedowns in front of the instructors with every chance he got, but everything that was asked of me was finished in such a way that proved beyond any reasonable doubt that I was clearly capable of much, much more than what I was showing. So I fulfillled both of my ends of the bargain. I hid 75% of my abilities, just as my father wanted me to, but damn if I hadn't held back on the other 25%.

Looking back, perhaps that was done as much out of my own selfishness as it was out of my obedience to my parents' principles of becoming a good shinobi. I, like any other child, _wanted_ to be recognized for my own brilliance. It was my own little backhanded way of showing off. Of course, at the age of six, one does not really think of the reality of the moral implications of one's actions. I had simply convinced myself that I was doing the right thing, no selfishness involved whatsoever, because all the adults around me believed so. My dad got what he wanted, and my mom got what she wanted. End of story.

It was halfway through the first semester when the signs that I was more than simply _different_ started showing. Every written test, I always finished first and always got a perfect score. Not just one or two minutes ahead of the next person, either – sometimes the difference was as much as half an hour, depending on how much we had to write and how much shown work was demanded for the calculations. Multiple choice tests I could literally finish in seconds. A lot of these questions were common sense - if I didn't know the answer, I could easily reason it out.

I will give myself the benefit of the doubt and say that I was not finishing quickly on purpose for the sake of proving my own superiority to my classmates, as most children would do, but rather, to prove my own ego to myself – and to my parents. I liked games, and so to me, every test was like a game, and my score was determined by how much time I had left. Besides, the more time I had left, the more time I would have to go outside to the Academy playground and train by myself. I knew that sitting for a few more minutes to check my work would not help me any more than not checking my work, whereas exercising my muscles would. One of my father's many philosophies, after all, had been _those born blessed with a superior mind must still work like anyone else to develop a superior body._ And, as my mother's work ethic always taught me, _take advantage of every second you've got_ – and so I did.

My raw strength had been just the same as all the other students', but when it came to things like technique – how to most _efficiently_ distribute power – I had an edge. I was a fast learner, a fast mover, and highly coordinated, and so physically I could deal out more damage than the rest of my friends even though we all were more or less on the same level strength-wise. And so no matter how many shuriken Sasuke Uchiha, the runner-up, threw, no matter how many ANBU Naruto Uzumaki, the dead-last, outran, the Academy teachers soon pronounced that it would be impossible for anyone to catch up to me.

Which wasn't true. I knew I was smart _now_ , but if there was one thing my father warned me against it was arrogance, because no man can control the future perfectly.

But never mind that. Despite being Shikamaru Nara, I was still just a regular six-year-old, and whatever words of wisdom my father came up with, they would surely be ignored in favor of so-called _experience_ when they passed through my lips.

And therein came the source of my parents' first – and, luckily, their last – argument.

It had started innocently enough. At around the end of the first semester marking period, the Academy instructors and some other Konoha officials had analyzed my scores, and, after realizing that they were leaps and bounds ahead of anyone else they had ever seen, including all of the child prodigies that had come before me, considered bumping me up a few classes.

I was still young and naïve then, for all of my intelligence. I had had no opinion on the matter at the time. I was just a kid. As long as I could still have my friends and praise from my parents and teachers I was happy. Vaguely I knew that I was a smart and special kid, since everyone always told me that, but I couldn't exactly _tell_ just how far apart I was from my classmates. When you're six years old, you are _you_ and they are _them_. So what if I had more gold stars than everyone else? Ino was Ino and Choji was Choji and Sasuke was Sasuke and Naruto was Naruto and biologically speaking, your brain takes a while to fully develop its own sense of self.

My mother, on the other hand, had been all for it.

That was when my father stepped in and rescued me.

" _No_ ," he had said, and put down his foot firmly, and so even the Hokage, who had been wholly in favor of the idea, backed down. "Just – _no_."

The nice thing about being a Nara was that no matter how quietly you talked, when you talked (and I mean _actually_ speaking, not just complaining), people _listened._

But my mother was a Nara, too, by name if not by birth, and she had had different ideas. A headstrong woman, she could not fathom why anyone wouldn't take such a grand opportunity when it was right in his face like so. That night, she had asked – well, _demanded_ was a more appropriate word, seeing as this was my _mother_ – to know just exactly why my father was halting my education.

Of course, he had anticipated this question, and had had an entire list prepared.

And so we come back to me – six years old, huddled up against the wall, hidden in the shadows, finally getting a glimpse of what the fate of a child like me might be.

"No child genius has ever had a nice life. Not in the shinobi world. Shikamaru can have fame and glory if he likes, but it will _not_ be as a child prodigy. His life will be hard enough as an adult, in this line of work. Let him be happy while he can."

My mother might be considered by many to be a bossy and overbearing woman, but never let it be said that she didn't know reason when she heard it.

When the next day finally arrived, there was no more of that "ridiculous talk" (my father's words, not mine) of me graduating early. I would stay put where I was, with children my age, and grow up normally – or, I suppose, as normally as anyone could, being bombarded with all this war and desensitization propaganda at the age of six moving forward.

Still, my mother managed to convince my father that he should help fuel my talent before it died out completely, since it was clear that I was becoming bored at school. That, my father could agree on – he didn't particularly care how far I advanced between ages six and twelve, as long as I didn't put on the Konoha hitai-ate any earlier than that. I think in the ideal world, for him, children wouldn't formally complete their education until they were at least eighteen, but when they finally did, we'd be pumping out students no less than jonin level. For him, one did not become a Chunin after one passed the Chunin Exams – one should already be high-Chunin level walking into that thing. No point in taking a potentially lethal test only to fail, or worse, die.

I suppose this arrangement ended up being all the better for me. I had friends in my class – Choji and Ino from before the Academy days (though more Choji than Ino, who liked to play with the other girls, too) – and I didn't want to leave them. Even if Sasuke had a habit of sulking and being moody for no apparent reason, and Naruto and Kiba were a bit on the boisterous side. They were still my friends. Anyway, my teachers were knowledgeable of my situation, too (as they were the ones who had brought up the whole "skip six grades" idea to my father and the Hokage in the first place), and usually let me do my own work while they helped the rest of the class on a concept that I had mastered a long time ago. Plus, at night, unlike the rest of my friends, I got to stay up late, sometimes even past twelve, sitting around a bonfire with my father and watching the light and shadow flicker around on the ground.

My childhood was a quite pleasant one, apart from the regular trials and tribulations of children.

But time flies so quickly, and soon I was looking at my own reflection on my polished forehead protector, wondering when I turned twelve.

Maybe that was why my father liked to take things so slowly.

(But I never forgot my father's boogeyman, and all throughout my life, his words – words that he didn't even know I had heard – would haunt me.)

( _"Those who walk the shadows may very well become one with them."_ )


	2. The Desk Chunin's Lament

**A/N: Shikamaru always speaks in 1st person; everyone else is in 3rd person limited. There is a very specific reason for this weird POV style, one which I can't tell you until the story is over.**

* * *

 _The night after graduation_

 _The Konoha Shinobi Academy_

 _Emergency post-year end conference meeting_

"What the heck are we going to do?" Iruka Umino whined, banging his head against the table.

"Naruto Uzumaki finally passed, so now at least you won't have to deal with a two-man team," Genma mentioned unhelpfully. Especially since he had been the one to pass the little squirt in the first place. God, what had he been thinking?

Oh, right. The Multi-Shadow Clone technique.

Damn.

"This is the _most_ dysfunctional graduating class I've _ever_ had," Iruka groaned. "I can't put either Ino or Sakura, or _any_ of the girls with Sasuke – I've _seen_ the way they run after him in class, and that's just _cruel_. Not to mention it would cause a highly disruptive team dynamic, and we can't have anyone getting hurt just because someone was too busy ogling someone else!...but then we _have_ to have one girl on each team. It's a perfect fit this year. Nine girls, eighteen boys. That's a two to one ratio, and we can't mess it up, or the teams will be unbalanced. People will complain."

"More like _you_ will complain, Mr. OCD," Genma muttered under his breath.

"What was that?"

"Nothing!"

"What about Hinata Hyuga? She's quiet. I don't think I've seen her run around after Sasuke like the other girls do," Daikoku suggested.

That seemed to placate Iruka somewhat, and he drew a line between Sasuke Uchiha and Hinata Hyuga. "But wait – that's two dojutsu wielders on the same team – won't that be unfair?"

"What choice do we have?" Daikoku asked. "If it's as you say, then this is the best solution. Would you rather put the Last Uchiha with Hinata Hyuga, or some rabid fangirl?"

Right. He had a point there. Anyway, the other teams would end up with clan heirs, too. This entire year was full of clan heirs. What the hell were they all thinking, getting their wives pregnant all at the exact same time? Good God! It was a conspiracy!

Iruka sighed. "That still leaves the whole 'class genius'/'dead last' issue…in an ideal situation, we're supposed to put Naruto Uzumaki on Sasuke Uchiha's team, and make _them_ our frontline combat team. That's how it's always done. But this year, our Nara student was actually willing to _pick up his pencil_ to take his tests – " there was a sarcastic giggle among the crowd of shinobi, which Iruka ignored – "so _he's_ at the top of the class instead. Which means we can't have a repeat of the Ino-Shika-Cho trio, which is a shame, because that's the most successful Capture and Interrogation team format we've had, _ever_. But we can't put Naruto with anyone _but_ Shikamaru, because, once again, we have to make things fair. We could try to preserve Ino-Shika-Cho, but that might lead to that whole team imbalance issue again. Which one's more important?"

"I'd say team balance over Ino-Shika-Cho," Aoba said, pushing up his glasses with his pinky. "It's not the end of the world. Shikamaru will be good for Naruto. He's intelligent and responsible, but he also has a rather even temper. He's one of the few people who doesn't make fun of the kid, apart from Choji and Shino. If you put him with Sasuke, they'd do nothing but fight all the time. You'll notice that even though Shikamaru's at the top of the class, it's Sasuke who Naruto picks fights with all the time."

"I guess that works…" Iruka sighed. "So that leaves the other ladies. Sakura and Ino."

"I'd advise against putting Sakura on Naruto's team. Naruto as a crush on Sakura, but Sakura absolutely hates Naruto. She can be very cutting with her words, and sometimes she hits him. It would disrupt team dynamics very badly," Suzume said. "Ino is a childhood friend of Shikamaru, and while she doesn't like Naruto at all that much, she can tolerate him much better than Sakura would. Anyway, you've got two-thirds of Ino-Shika-Cho there. Naruto is no Akimichi, but with the right training he might grow up to be a decent brawler, which would fit that particular role in this team combination. It'll be good for the kids to take a step away from their parents, anyway. It'd be a different thing if Ino-Shika-Cho was something running for multiple generations, but that had only been once. No need to start tradition and doom the rest of their grandkids to the same team for the rest of their lives."

"Don't you feel a little bad, cutting Choji out of the equation, though?" Genma asked, taking the senbon out of his mouth. Then he shrugged. "Whatever. You're the one delivering the list to the Hokage, not me. He can talk to the Akimichi if they raise any questions."

"I guess we'll put Choji with Sasuke and Hinata?" Iruka asked. "Choji has a pretty even temper, too. He'll be good for Sasuke – that boy raised some major red flags on his last psych report, by the way. Which leaves…Shino and Kiba with Sakura. That's as fair as I can make it. All the other teams will stay as is."

"Sounds good," Suzume said. "So now…traditionally the class genius/dead last combination goes to the frontline battle team, but this year that's our capture and interrogation team. Frontline battle will have to be Sasuke, Hinata, and Choji – which is good; they're all well-suited for that fact since they have strong taijutsu backgrounds. And then the intel team will do well with just Shino and Kiba. Sadly, Sakura doesn't have any dojutsu, but if we put that team with Kurenai Yuuhi…she might be able to pass on a few genjutsu or two."

Iruka hastily scribbled down the suggestions. God, he was getting too old for this. So what if he was only twenty-two? They didn't pay him enough for this sort of stress, dammit! He deserved a good night's rest after the Mizuki incident, but _no_ , he just _had_ to go and promote Naruto, meaning that all of this team assignment business had to be scrapped and thrown back together from scratch. Stupid, stupid him.

"Sakura is a natural at chakra control. Yes, that would be a good fit. But…what of the other two teams? Seven and ten?" Daikoku mumbled, tapping his chin. "We can't fail _any_ of those three teams – seven, eight, and ten. They're all of the clan children, for Kami's sake. We'll _have_ to put Sasuke with Kakashi, since he's the only Sharingan wielder left…but then the class genius/dead last combination is traditionally taught by a member of the previous Team 7…but then this year it's a little different, since our frontline team no longer fits that qualification…"

"But Hatake _always_ fails all of his teams," Genma pointed out. "You know, that whole entire 'teamwork' test dating back to the First Hokage?"

"He _what_?" Iruka asked.

"He's failed every single team he's ever gotten, because none of them could work together," Genma said.

"Well, that's an issue," Iruka mumbled. "Sasuke's biggest problem is working in a team."

"We can't just _fail_ the Last Uchiha," Suzume said.

"We _could_ put Ino-Shika-Na with him, and see how it works out?" Aoba suggested. "I mean, if _any_ team is going to work together well enough to pass that test, it has got to be them. Naruto isn't the sharpest tool in the shed, if you know what I mean, but Shikamaru and Ino will be able to pull him through, and _they_ know plenty about teamwork…Kakashi's _got_ to get a team sooner or later. We can't let a guy as overpowered as he is go through his whole life without getting even _one_ student. Plus, Hatake's a former ANBU - I'd say he's more qualified to teach a tracker/retrieval team than Asuma. Asuma's always been more fit for frontline fighting anyway."

"But the whole Sharingan thing…Arrrgh!" Iruka threw down his pen in frustration.

"Look, Sasuke doesn't have a Sharingan yet. When he finally develops it, we'll just make Hatake tutor him in private, if need be. That way there's no accusations of favoritism within a team," Aoba said. "Problem solved. Anyway, most Uchihas didn't really _need_ someone to teach them to use their eyes. They all just kind of figured it out themselves, right? I think Sasuke will be fine, regardless of if he has someone to teach him how to use his eyes or not. Right now his biggest problem is teamwork, and Asuma's supposed to be good with that, yes?"

Iruka rubbed his head. "Fine. Team Ten goes to Asuma, and Team Seven goes to Kakashi. Anything else? Because I _swear_ to _god_ – "

"Good thing that worked out," Genma grinned, "because I actually overheard Hatake telling the Hokage – well, demanding, more like – that he wanted the Uzumaki kid on his team."

"What? _That_ Uzumaki?" Suzume gasped.

"There's only one," Genma shrugged.

"Whoa. Stop right there. You said he _wanted_ Naruto Uzumaki on his team?"

"Why _him_ of all people, though?" Suzume asked. "You'd think he'd be begging for someone else closer to his level…like, Shikamaru or Sasuke. _Naruto_ , really? Why?"

"Beats me," Genma shrugged. "This is just hearsay. I don't know the whole context. Apparently everything anyone knows about that guy is solely between him and Sandaime-sama. All I know is that for some reason he wants to have a chance to test Naruto, and he won't stand for it otherwise. And you know what? The Hokage actually gave in! Well, not really, since he said it was up to the Academy teachers to assign teams and teachers, but he also implied that he'd turn a blind eye to whatever other strings he might pull in order to get, you know, the kid on his team. And Hatake has his hands wrapped around a _lot_ of strings; believe me."

"AND YOU NEVER SAW FIT TO TELL ME THAT WE MIGHT HAVE TO START OVER JUST TO APPEASE THIS JERKASS UNTIL _AFTER_ WE ASSIGNED THESE TEAMS?" Iruka exploded.

"Can he really do something like that? You know, demand certain students?"

"Formally, I don't think so, but this is _Kakashi Hatake_ we're talking about. That guy can passive-aggressive bitch his way out of anything."

"You don't think it's because of the you-know-what…?"

"That would be a good reason to _run away_ , not get even closer."

"Remember, though, this is Kakashi Hatake. He's messed up enough as it is. Isn't that what weirdoes like him do? Go running after danger? 'Sides, the kid's not that dangerous, really, barring the whole pranking people thing."

"All right, all right, already! Enough!" Iruka yelled over the din, picking up the pen and rewriting the final draft of the team list. "Here's the _last edition_ , and _no more edits_ , or I _swear_ to _god_ I will find you and _murder_ you in your sleep!…ahem. Anyway…Team One will be…"

* * *

"…Team Seven: Shikamaru Nara, Ino Yamanaka, and Naruto Uzumaki, under Kakashi Hatake. Team Eight: Shino Aburame, Sakura Haruno, and Kiba Inuzaka. Your sensei will be Kurenai Yuuhi. Team Ten: Sasuke Uchiha, Hinata Hyuga, and Choji Akimichi, and you will be working with Asuma Sarutobi." Iruka threw down the clipboard in finality, completely ignoring the outraged gasps of all the girls who _didn't_ get to be with their precious Sasuke-kun. He had wasted too many hours of sleep trying to make these team assignments perfect, dammit, and he was _not_ going to go back and fix any of it just to placate some whiny preteens.

"Iruka-sensei, why can't _I_ be with Sasuke-kuuun~"

"BECAUSE I ALREADY WASTED TOO MANY HOURS OF SLEEP TRYING TO MAKE THESE TEAM ASSIGNMENTS PERFECT, DAMMIT, AND I AM _NOT_ GOING TO GO BACK AND FIX ANY OF IT JUST TO PLACATE SOME WHINY PRETEENS!" he yelled.

Stunned silence.

Hah. For once they finally all shut up. He cleared his throat.

"That's it for today, folks. Your new teachers will meet with you after the lunch break. I'll have a rooms list posted on the doors by then."

He neglected to tell them that two-thirds of them would probably be destined for cannon fodder oblivion instead of actually training to be an elite team underneath some famed Jonin, but oh well. Some things in the shinobi world had to be learned the hard way, and this was just the beginning.

* * *

Kakashi Hatake was having a good day. A very good day. He was about to meet three new cute little genin, as Sandaime-sama made him do every year, nice and impressionable and perfect for terrorizing. As Ibiki always made clear, words were as much of a weapon as any steel blade, and it was amazing what a few words here or there could do to supposedly "trained" ninja.

Then he remembered that _this_ year, of the three kids he was stuck with (or rather, they were stuck with _him_ – if they passed), the first was a certified genius, the second was the sole heir to a clan of mind-readers, and the third was the jinchuuriki of the Nine-Tailed Fox and his dead sensei's son to boot.

On second thought, maybe this lot might be more difficult to fool than the others.

A shame he hadn't gotten Obito's (fourth? fifth? eighth?) cousin, too, but maybe that was for the best. From Sasuke's psych evaluation, the boy would have been a massive pain in the posterior to deal with. It was scarily similar to his own, when he had been at the same age, actually. (Now, he was still just as messed up, but at least he knew how to deal with it better – with smiles both real and false at the few people he dared to let into his sadly limited friendship circle.)

Perhaps that was why it was a bad idea – they were too similar, and that definitely wouldn't work out. The boy could learn a thing or two from a mellow guy like Asuma. Kakashi shuddered to think at how he might have turned out, if he had landed a sensei as cold-hearted as he was – say, Orochimaru – instead of bright-and-smiley-never-angry Minato Namikaze.

Oh, well. No time to think depressing thoughts right now. He was about to meet some rather sensitive youngsters, and apparently you weren't supposed to scare them with stories of death or PTSD until after it was already too late for them to quit.

He wondered how they would deal, when the time finally came.

"YOU'RE LATE!"

Oh, was he? Hmmm…he was supposed to meet them at…when _did_ they say he was supposed to meet them? He actually didn't remember.

The girl – Yamanaka's daughter, Ino – was the one yelling. Shikamaru Nara was just giving him a quiet, vaguely disappointed look, the same one Shikaku Nara often gave to the desk Chunin when he thought that they were being particularly exasperating or stupid. And Naruto was unusually quiet…ah, he was trapped in Shikamaru's shadow. That explained things.

"He was just about to prank you for being late," Shikamaru somehow managed to explain calmly while clearly demonstrating just exactly how pissed off he was. Ah, good. Kakashi was very fond of pissing people off. "Something with the eraser."

"Booby trap!" Naruto insisted. "It's called a _booby trap_! And I was just testing him!"

"If he fell for something like that, it would be on purpose," Shikamaru sighed, slowly letting go of Naruto.

Shit. Tricking these kids would be harder than he thought.

"Maa, maa, no need for that sort of behavior right now," he waved a hand airily. "Meet me up on the roof in five, yes?"

It would take them longer than five minutes to get up to the roof, he knew. He always asked his teams to meet him in this particular room because the stairs to the roof were on the other side of the school building. Unless they already knew _shunshin_. Or –

"We climbed up the side of the building," Shikamaru explained, swinging a leg over the side of the railing. "The stairs were too far away to make it in five minutes. Unless you planned this?"

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "Climbed?"

"I did, because I'm that awesome!" Naruto yelled, jumping over and leaving a shaking tree in his wake. "But I think those two cheated. They had tape or something on their hands." He started to brush the twigs and leaves out of his hair.

"Chakra," Ino said.

Naruto paused, one hand halfway to his sandal, where several leaves had embedded themselves underneath his toes. "What's that?"

"You don't know what _chakra_ is?" Ino slumped, one eyebrow raised exasperatedly.

Kakashi leaned forward pinched the bridge of his nose.

 _Oh, sensei, have mercy on my soul…_

"It's that…thing…stuff…" Naruto made vague waving motions with his hands, "…right?"

Ino dropped her face into her hands. "Spiritual energy! It's the spiritual energy that all shinobi have! It's what you use to do jutsu! You'd know if you actually showed up to class instead of ditching school and playing pranks!"

Naruto scratched the back of his head sheepishly.

"I guess that's one thing we'll have to teach him ASAP," Shikamaru shrugged.

 _Oh, good. They're thinking as a team already._

Ino looked ready to cry, but she didn't say anything. She didn't seem to begrudge Naruto for not knowing how to chakra walk – no one except for clan children learned before graduating from the Academy (although they _should_ , in Kakashi's very justified opinion!) – as much as the fact that he didn't know what chakra even _was_. Kakashi didn't blame her. In the exact same situation he would have been ten times worse. Obito, at the very least, had had a passable knowledge of the Academy curriculum; he was just clumsy. Also, he had that annoying habit of thinking with his heart instead of his head. But, you know. At least he knew what chakra was.

"Yeah, but, like, what _is_ chakra?" Naruto scratched his head.

"Naruto, I just _told_ you!" Ino screeched.

"I know _that_ ," Naruto said, "but what _is_ it? 'Cause, you know, how fire is, well, fire…and then Iruka-sensei said something about the sun's rays being electonetic or whatever – "

"Eletromagnetic radiation," Shikamaru supplied.

"Yeah, that," Naruto said. "And then when you drop an apple, that's gravity, and then when I kick something, that's…uh…mech...uh..."

"Mechanical energy."

"Sure. Whatever. And then chemicals are like chemical energy, right? So what's chakra?"

Shikamaru blinked. Once. Twice.

Even Ino (Screechy, as he had privately nicknamed her) seemed at a loss for words.

Kakashi, on the other hand, had an answer ready. "Chakra, my dear student, is _chakratic energy_."

They all blinked at him.

"...What?"

"...You just pulled that answer out of your ass, didn't you," Ino deadpanned.

Kakashi chose to respond to that by changing the subject. "Right, so, I'm sure you all already know who I am, so how about you introduce yourselves, since I don't really know much about any of you."

"What do you want us to tell you?" Ino asked.

"How about you tell us what you already know about us, and we'll fill in the gaps," Shikamaru suggested.

"But I don't know anything about you," Kakashi said.

"You probably already know our names, heights and weights, grades, and that sort of thing from the Academy files. They give those to you, right?" Shikamaru asked. "And you kind of know our personalities, too, from that earlier interaction. What else have you deduced about us?"

"Humor me," Kakashi grinned. Except no one could really see it underneath the mask.

Ino narrowed her eyes. "Why don't you go first. You look kind of sketchy."

Him? Sketchy? Really? Ah, well, he supposed so. People often told him he looked like some sort of burglar. Except that the clever ones normally didn't wear masks and actually liked to rob houses in the middle of the day while posing as delivery men and such instead of actual, well, _burglars_. He should know; he had been on quite a few lockpicking missions.

"My name is Kakashi Hatake," he drawled. "I like some things. I dislike some things."

"What sort of things?" Shikamaru interrupted.

"Stuff."

"And what sort of stuff?"

"Things." He silently giggled to himself. He could play this game for _hours_. He _had_ played this game for hours, actually. With both Ibiki and Inoichi. And he had won, too. Now _that_ had been just incredible _fun_.

Shikamaru glared at him, then sighed. "Go on."

Aw. Boring. Oh, well. "My hobbies? I have a few hobbies, I suppose. Dreams for the future? I don't feel like telling you that. Right, your turn!"

Ino sighed.

"Ooh! Ooh! Me first! Me first!" Naruto bounced up and down, like an excited puppy. "I'm Naruto Uzumaki! I like cup ramen! I dislike the three minutes you have to wait while the ramen cooks! I dream to be the next Hokage! And my hobbies are – my hobbies are – " he trailed off, pausing. "Pranks, I guess."

Ino gave him _the look_. One that said, _did you really just give out all this personal information to the same guy that refused to tell you anything?_

"We can sit here all day," Kakashi said, "or you guys can be smart like him and just get it over with."

"I don't think it's fair that you're not telling us anything!" Ino protested. "Look, I know you're a Jonin and I'm a Genin, but we're all Konoha shinobi on the same team and my dad always said that teammates should know each other! And if you're not going to give us anything about you then…that's not fair!" she repeated.

Kakashi rolled his eyes. "Look. I did tell you the truth. At this point in my career, I don't have very many likes, dislikes, hobbies, or dreams for the future, unless you count staying alive and hoping that another secret war doesn't break out," he told her cheerfully, injecting as much sarcasm into his words as possible. "Anyway…while you're technically legal adults, capable of making your own decisions as shinobi of Konoha…you're still not allowed to drink or do other special things until you're older. So I can't tell you about any of that, or the Hokage will call me in and lecture me and give me a slap on the wrist, and I really don't like getting slapped on the wrist. So go ahead. Tell me about what you do for fun. Maybe I'm looking for suggestions for self-improvement, and so far I don't think 'pranks' is proper behavior for someone of my rank."

At this, both Ino and Shikamaru raised their eyebrows at him dubiously. Ah. Evidently, their parents had told them many a horror story about the Fearsome Kakashi Hatake, Scourge of the Desk Chunin Everywhere.

"And if they were, they'd be subtle enough that everyone knew it was me but no one would be able to prove it," he added.

"All right," the girl sighed, giving in. "I'm Ino Yamanaka. I like…" Insert blush. "…umm…my friends. And I dislike bullies and…" her eyes narrowed, "…people who abandon their friends." Kakashi raised an eyebrow, before remembering the notes in her file – _Used to be best friends with Sakura Haruno (Team 8), then suddenly became bitter enemies starting 6_ _th_ _year. Link to Sasuke Uchiha (Team 10) suspected. Keep all three of them away from each other until they've finished puberty._ Her fists unclenched. "My hobbies are reading and arranging flowers and keeping up with the latest fashions. And I don't know exactly what I want to do yet, but I hope to be like my dad. Better, even."

"And I'm Shikamaru Nara. I like the weather here. I dislike it when people are ridiculously late and waste others' time." Kakashi's grin underneath his mask grew even wider at that. "As for hobbies, I like to read and play board games with my dad. And I don't know what I want to do in the future, either, but I suppose it'll be like my dad, too."

"Well, excellent," Kakashi clapped his hands together. "You have your own distinct interests and personalities. Now, I've got some good news and some bad news."

"Bad news first! Always bad news first!" Ino exclaimed.

"Right. Well, I have to tell you that of the twenty-seven that made it out of the Academy, only nine actually become Genin – at the discretion of their Jonin instructor, who is to give them all a second exam."

"What?" Ino shrieked. God, she was _loud_. "Then what was the final exam for?"

Kakashi leaned his head on his hand. "That was to sort out the kids who actually had a chance of passing. Basic skills and such. I get to decide if I want you as my students or not."

"When you say nine out of twenty-seven," Shikamaru asked, "do you mean nine out of twenty-seven, or three teams of three out of nine teams of three? Because I distinctly remember Iruka-sensei complaining that he had spent an inordinate amount of effort trying to balance all the teams out, and that there was no way he was going to do any of that _again_ , so…"

And there went the whole premise of his test.

Damn, that kid was inconveniently clever. Stupid Naras.

He chose to respond to that statement with one of his so-called "infuriating" half-smiles.

"Oi, sensei! What's the good news, then?" Naruto yelled.

"Oh, that? You won't have to take that test until tomorrow. 5 A.M. at Training Ground 3. Don't eat breakfast; you'll throw up. Sweet dreams, everyone!"

And he popped out of their sight, the indignant screams of the Yamanaka girl still ringing in his sensitive ears.

He _so_ loved getting people angry.


	3. For Whom the Bell Tolls

BONUS #1

(Thanks for the first 100 reviews, guys!)

 _If This Shikamaru Met Canon Shikamaru_

"Laziness is the mother of all bad habits...but ultimately she is a mother and we ought to respect that."

"And just think, about how much better off the world might have been if you had given her contraceptives."

"...Verbally sparring with you takes too much effort."

* * *

 _Training Ground 3, at approximately 5:00 A.M._

 _...give or take a few hours_

"And whoever doesn't get a bell simply has to go back to the Academy. Simple as that."

Naruto and Ino looked horrified, but I knew better. I knew he was bluffing. It was against the rules to break up a team once it had been formed. A team passed and failed together; that was how Konoha operated. Either he passed us all and took us as his students, or he failed us all.

Now, I didn't know how much leverage my father had over someone like Kakashi Hatake, even if he was the Jonin Commander, because from his many stories over the dinner table, that was a man who seemed to dance to his own tune. So perhaps he _might_ just fail us all, and damn the consequences – the Nara and the Yamanaka were rather minor clans compared to the big four, and, according to my dad, while Kakashi Hatake wasn't powerful enough to change tradition dating back to the time of the Shodaime all on his own, he _had_ had enough standing as an individual at the age of thirteen to face down even the whole Uchiha clan in its entirety before they were all massacred a few years back.

I supposed it made sense. The Uchiha wouldn't have given up one of their precious eyes without a fight. I'm not sure _how_ he got it – Dad wouldn't tell me, because it was "his story to tell, not mine" – but I at least knew that he had one. Ninja weren't especially creative with names, and it didn't take a genius to figure out the reason behind the whole "Sharingan no Kakashi" or "Kakashi the Copy-Nin" shebang. One thing was for sure – if he passed the three of us, it wouldn't be because of our last names.

I doubted he'd stoop to using the Sharingan for three Genin, though. Even if we _were_ good. There were certain perks that came from having the Jonin Commander for your father, and knowing the good gossip about everyone that mattered was one of them. According to him, Kakashi Hatake had a rather massive reputation, but his supposedly infamous combat skills only made up about a tenth of it.

"So what's the rest of it?" I had asked him.

His only answer had been to shake his head pityingly at me and say nothing more.

Which only meant that I'd have to go to the next best source for dirt – Ino. Ino, at least, had had better luck with her own dad, mainly because, like Ino, Inoichi Yamanaka was the central hub of gossip in his own generation. And Ino's dad, unlike mine, had been all too willing to complain about this Kakashi Hatake person.

"Oh, that guy? He's the biggest troll I've ever met and…yep, that about sums it up."

Well, maybe not.

But at least we now knew that we were dealing with a head case for a prospective Jonin sensei. (Something I already learned from my parents' argument six years ago.)

I didn't know how I felt about that. My future teacher being completely insane, I mean.

Looking at the man standing in front of us now, still grinning with his one visible eye even though he was several hours late, I didn't doubt it. Five in the morning, my ass. "I was chasing after a rabbit for my breakfast cereal" – yeah, right. What a liar. I shouldn't have expected any different from him.

We did have time to eat a nice breakfast, while waiting for him, though. So at least we hadn't fallen for _that_ particular lie. Starving shinobi were poor shinobi and thus I thanked Kami that I was born in a land where the climate and soil was good enough that we didn't have to import any of our food.

Maybe he had done it on purpose? To give us a chance to scout out the terrain of the training ground while he was absent? We _had_ done that. But…was he really the type to do that? I guess they had to set _some_ restrictions on how Jonin tested Genin…though how closely those rules were followed was a mystery to me. Kakashi Hatake didn't seem like the type to follow the rules. He didn't seem like the type to be merciful just for the hell of it, either.

Once again, the _not knowing why_ he was late bothered me more than him actually being late, and that was saying something, because I take after my mother when it comes to my opinion on wasting time.

He shook the bells at us tauntingly, and, as if in agreement, his little red alarm clock also tittered mockingly. "Well?"

 _Time waits for no one. It just moves on, a wealth that once is lost can't be earned back,_ my mother had always said.

He was probably late just because he wanted to see if he could rile us up. Judging from Naruto's and Ino's still-furious expressions (and mine, too), he had been very successful in that, because all three of us hated him already.

I stared at him again, trying to get any sort of reading from him. About half of what he had just told us wasn't true, and the other half was a total lie. I knew that. There wasn't much else I could discern from him, other than the fact that he really was completely batty (something already established multiple times in the past day). His clothes were too baggy for me to determine his body type and possible fighting style (whether or not this was on purpose or just laziness and a general "I don't care what other people think" attitude on this part was also unknown to me), and his blank expression was so carefully crafted beneath his rage-inducing attitude that I might as well have been trying to create a psychological profile of a brick wall.

A brick wall that had been decorated in the ugliest and most annoying migraine-inducing animated wallpaper ever known to man.

I didn't know what that looked like, but if one could take Kakashi Hatake's personality and market it as wallpaper, that would be what it would look like.

The real question was, should I call his bluff? Should I not?

I should not. Even if I called his bluff, and told him exactly what I knew – something that Dad always said was dangerous, since knowledge, like bargaining chips, wasn't something you laid down flat in front of the enemy – he could still fail us all, and perhaps grade us even harder now that we knew the rules. Sometimes calling a bluff would allow an automatic pass, but that wouldn't be the case here. He was annoying to me because he was unreadable, not because he was stupid. Far from it. His infuriating smile was definitely hiding something, and yet I had no idea what it was. There was nothing I hated more than that half state of knowing and yet not.

The more experienced a Jonin was, the more messed up they were, and thus the more ruthless in their mind games. He was probably the type to try and trick us into doing something illegal, and, if we pointed out that we knew, would make us do it anyway just to see if we wouldn't get caught. And when we did, he could point out that it was our fault entirely since we knew and did it anyway, and if we had just kept our mouths shut we'd at least be able to plead ignorance.

Better to play dumb, until we knew a bit more about what he had in store. This was his game, with his rules, and so he had the advantage.

When I was little I would play a card game called Mao with my cousins and friends. Every once in a while, when it's not shogi or chess, my Dad and I still play. The premise of the game is simple. You try to get rid of all of your cards, kind of like in Crazy Eights or Uno, but there are certain rules in how you can lay them down. The problem is, you don't know all of those rules. Only the current Rule Setter does. Break a rule and you have to add cards to your hand. The rules can be anything as logical as "the next card has to be of the same suit or number as the previous card", or anything as stupid as "every time the girl closest to you goes, you have to say 'Chicken Ramen'". The trick is to find out what all the rules are before you've gained too many cards.

Here, it was the same. We were playing Mao against Kakashi Hatake. We knew the basic form of play, but not all of the rules. He did. We had to find those rules – or at least some of them – to even out the playing field.

But we couldn't say anything. Not when Naruto still had his arm pinned behind his back, his own kunai pointed at the back of his head.

"Well then," Kakashi shrugged, releasing Naruto and attaching the bells to his belt, "if you're ready, then… _go_!"

Not wasting any time, the three of us ran off to hide.

Or, at least, Ino and I did. Naruto was still standing on top of the grassy knoll in all of his orange glory, yelling something about a fair fight.

Naruto, I'm sorry, but "Shinobi" and "fair fight" do _not_ belong together in the same sentence.

We'd have to correct Naruto's behavior, seeing as we'd be stuck with him until we became Chunin and started to lead our own cells. Unless, of course, his current classification as a highly visible target was actually a trick to hide his true nature – but I doubted that. For now, his hotheadedness would serve as a semi-useful distraction to our target. Now was a good time to plan, when Kakashi was busy marvelling at Naruto's…er, _orange_ -ness.

I felt a little bad, using Naruto to buy time for the rest of us without him knowing, but I had no other choice. I couldn't communicate with him if he was just _standing_ there out in the open like that, and if we waited for Kakashi Hatake to finish up with Naruto, none of us would have any time left.

Watching Kakashi Hatake vs. Naruto Uzumaki was not pretty. To call it a fight would have been implying that Naruto even had a chance – I'd more accurately describe it as an entirely one-sided curbstomp. I was well aware that this wasn't even a Jonin's proper strength. I should know. My mother's a Chunin, and she never clowned around this much.

Actually, on second thought, that was a bad example. Izumo and Kotetsu, at the front gate. There we go. They clowned around, too, but even they wouldn't waste their time reading and fighting at the same time. That seemed like the ultimate way to insult Naruto – not considering him good enough to even give him your full and undivided attention, and yet somehow able to toy with him to such an extent anyway.

Naruto was getting more and more riled up with each passing second as he was unable to land even a hit on Kakashi. And when he became riled up, his movements were even sloppier. And when his movements became sloppy, Kakashi would just rile him up even more.

At least, this was a good thing for the rest of us. It meant that Kakashi Hatake was treating us like weak and powerless Genin instead of taking us seriously. Or, at least, he was treating Naruto like a weak and powerless Genin. He might be more wary of Ino and me since we had our clan techniques and extra training.

"NARUTO! That's a tiger seal! Get out of there; you'll be killed!"

 _Oh, no, Ino! Don't give away your position so easily…_

And… _yep_. Another bluff. All Naruto would suffer was a sore behind and some wounded pride, although…

My eyes nearly popped out of my head when his fingers actually connected. I took a few seconds to wrap my head around just how far Naruto was flying with that one poke. That had to be unreal; it really did. Even normal ninja would have trouble throwing a _kunai_ that far…

We were way out of our leagues here. That was definitely confirmed. High Chunin to low Jonin level taijutsu and my clan's secret techniques – that really was all I had. That, and some above-average weapons skills and minor genjutsu. And a few other things, but like my father always said, I didn't want to give them away so early. Ino might know some genjutsu, maybe. Her clan technique was not suitable for combat. But even if it was, it wouldn't work here. As far as her dad was concerned, "Don't bother with scanning the mind of someone like Hatake. You won't like what you'll find in there. And on that note, certain names like the Three Sannin and Itachi Uchiha are also brains to avoid. Off-limits except to the highest level of ANBU training, got it?"

Ino, being Ino, had asked why.

"Because they were all out there slitting throats before the rest of their peers had even joined the Academy," my dad had drawled in response.

And that was that.

So we really didn't have much to go on. A few shuriken and kunai, the Shadow Possession Jutsu and its derivatives, and…solid clones? Huh, maybe Naruto could be of some use after all – Nope. Now he was dangling upside-down from a tree.

Meanwhile, here was a guy who could send us sailing with a single finger.

…Speaking of which, wasn't that something reserved for the likes of Lady Tsunade?

My mind was racing a mile a minute. I had to think fast. Naruto was already out, meaning that Kakashi would be coming for Ino and me next. I had next to no time to plan. Kakashi was walking over to Naruto now, and was bending down to pick up the bells, which were still on the ground where he had left them as snare bait…

 _I had already analyzed the strength of my teammates versus our opponent. Our chances didn't look good. No relying on super powerful techniques here. Our difference in intelligence was also questionable. Had it been anyone else, I might have rated myself as having a fair chance. But this was a Jonin whose craftiness was more feared than his skill. I thanked my dad for always complaining about him. I might have underestimated him otherwise. Maybe._

 _Moving on to terrain. This training ground was simple enough. Grass, three wooden posts, the Memorial Stone, the lunch boxes, the alarm clock. Not much going on over there, unless someone ran out of shuriken and decided that throwing rice and fish was the next best bet._

 _What about the surrounding forest? That, I think, would be off-limits to actual combat. Well. Not officially. But I knew that Kakashi knew that hiding in the shadows when you had a Nara on the other side was tactical suicide. Which was good; that meant he'd have to stay in the clearing where we could see him – although that meant he'd have an easier time keeping track of the shadows, too. Maybe we could use that to our advantage? We could hide in the shadows; he could not. Or rather, he couldn't stay in the shadows. If he zipped in and out of the trees on the other side of the clearing, he'd be too far away for me or my shadow to catch up to him in time._

 _The main problem, aside from the whole "he's a massive troll who lives off the pain and suffering of others" thing was that Kakashi Hatake was_ fast _. As expected; all Jonin were. But seeing him move against Naruto – or rather,_ not _seeing him move – put him in a completely different league of his own. Even with his legs chained together he could probably still dance circles around the three of us. Kagemane was faster than Ino's mind control, but it wasn't that fast. Besides, he knew I was a Nara. He would be expecting the Kagemane._

… _But that really was the only choice we had, wasn't it? Physical traps wouldn't work against him. I was high-Chunin-level in that respect, thanks to my mom, but even a Jonin wouldn't help me against this guy. There were very few problems that couldn't be solved with a simple Kawarimi. As Kakashi had just demonstrated. Besides, having a bunch of Narutos swarm him wouldn't work – I could latch on to the wrong person by accident, with so many shadows close together._

 _No. Wrong. There was always more than one way. I just hadn't found it yet._

 _We didn't have to rely on Kagemane. We should use it, since it was a good technique that I had experience with. But that didn't mean that it had to be our trump card. No shinobi should ever be completely reliant on one technique or tool. Just what else did we have under our belts? We had to have something. I refused to believe that this problem could not be solved._

 _Ino's mind control jutsu? I tossed that one out right away. That one wasn't useful for combat situations. And for god's sake, no hand-to-hand combat. Since Kakashi could, apparently, poke Naruto further than we could throw our weapons. I wasn't going to be dumb enough to try that a second time, not after Naruto had already gone through so much pain to show the rest of us that that was a Very Bad Idea. Wasn't there anything we could use?_

… _Of course! Academy techniques. That was it! They taught those things to us for a reason, right? Clone. Henge. And…_

 _Kawarimi. Of course. It was a simple one, but it was the fastest technique out there behind Shunshin and long-range teleportation. If someone managed to substitute with one of the bells…of course, it would require a great deal of precision, and we'd have to make sure that one of us would be in the right place to pick it up. In order to do that, though, we'd have to maneuver Kakashi into the right position, and keep him still just long enough for the switch to take place. And then we'd have to distract him from our true intentions._

 _Then we wouldn't be relying on the Kagemane after all. Kakashi would be expecting me to use my Kagemane to trap him somehow. I'd exploit his expectation, then._

 _Ino would be the best person to make the switch. Out of the three of us, she probably had the best chakra control. The Mind Possession Jutsu required more control than Shadow Possession, since it actually delved directly into the mind, whereas Shadow Possession was mostly superficial and left free will intact. The human brain was a very delicate thing, and turning a target's brain into a pile of completely unreadable mush because you used too much chakra was rather poor way to start an interrogation._

 _Now the question of how to hold the target still for long enough. Ino had decent aim against moving targets, but it was ridiculous to expect her to hit something she couldn't even see. On that note, if we used too many of Naruto's clones, they'd obscure her vision just as much as they impeded Kakashi's movements. About ten would be good. They'd have to give Kakashi a rather wide berth, though. I could feign using Naruto's clones as conduits to extend my own shadow, and then chase him to Ino's direct line of sight. And maybe get another Naruto clone to be ready to receive the bells when she switched._

 _Yes, this could work._

…Kakashi's fingers closed around the bells, and he straightened. Now, he was lecturing a still-trapped Naruto about "looking underneath the underneath". I'd only have a few seconds to communicate my plan. Hopefully it would be enough.

Scanning the clearing, I managed to find Ino, and my shadow snaked out to grab hers. I wrote in the dust, _"He'll probably come after you next, since you gave away your position before. When he does come after you, hold him off for a bit and then pretend to be defeated, got it? I just need…"_ I paused to do a mental calculation. _"60 seconds to tell Naruto his part of the plan, okay? I trust you can hold him off for that long. I'll send a Naruto clone over to 'help' you later. We have to work together for this. It's the only way we have a chance at beating him."_

I looked up; Naruto was alone again and Kakashi was gone. Hopefully he hadn't gotten to Ino yet. I hastily scratched out my message and kicked dust over the remains with the heel of my sandal so that no one else could read it, then let go of Ino's shadow so I could sneak over to Naruto and cut him free.

Of course, Naruto was ecstatic to no longer be upside-down, and when Naruto was ecstatic he was also very exuberant. And loud. Very loud.

" _Shhh!_ "

"Okay!"

"I have a plan!"

"'Kay, what is it?"

"There's two parts to it. Can you make another solid clone? Quietly?"

Naruto nodded, and a second one puffed into existence.

"Right," I nodded at original Naruto. "Kakashi is going after Ino now. She'll be distracting him, but she won't be able to hold him off for long. When he comes back, I need you to make more clones and swarm him like _this_ ," I said, sketching out a diagram of the training field and our positioning in the dirt. "Make sure to leave this gap here, facing Ino. Whatever happens, keep these positions. This is very important. Do you understand?"

"Yeah, but why?"

"I'll explain later, if it works. We don't have much time. Kakashi will be coming back any second now. Just – distract him, and get him into this position. Okay?"

Naruto shrugged. "All right. But the bells – "

"We'll deal with that later. Two is better than none. We're all Genin, Naruto. The only way we'll have a chance is if we all gang up on him. We'll figure out the bells thing later. Now, repeat back to me: what are you supposed to do, Naruto?"

"Distract our sensei-teme, and chase him over to Ino's side of the clearing, then swarm him, but leave a gap, right?"

"Right. You ready?"

Naruto nodded, and snuck off into the bushes.

"All right. Clone. _You_ are going to run off, and find Ino. She will lose to Kakashi on purpose, so make it look like you're there to help her, got it? Now, your 'boss' and some other clones will be leaving this gap when they attack Kakashi, right?"

"Yeah."

"Your job is to tell Ino her part of the plan. She's going to Kawarimi with the bells when she sees an opening, and you're going to grab them. Got it? Actual Naruto and the others are just a distraction."

"What about you?"

"I'm a distraction, too."

"Okay."

"So, repeat to me: what are you going to do?"

He wrinkled his nose. "Find Ino, tell her to Kawarimi with the bells when she sees the gap in the clones, and then grab the bells when she does, right?"

"Right."

"What do I do with the bells?"

"We'll deal with it _if_ we get the bells," I said.

"All right."

All of a sudden a very Ino-like scream filled the air, and then silence.

"That's your cue! Go!"

As soon as the clone had taken off, the mass of Naruto clones exploded out at Kakashi once again. I ran back to the middle of the clearing and started stretching out my shadow, pretending that I was going to get Kakashi from the back while the clones chased him from the front. Naturally, he didn't fall for it, and simply moved out of range.

That was when I switched to subterfuge level two: I retreated my shadow, but only back to where one of the other Naruto clones were conveniently standing. From there, it was all too simple to whip around the clones' shadows.

"Using Naruto's clones' shadows to lengthen your own," Kakashi commented loudly. "Quite clever. But not clever enough!" He danced out of reach again, right in front of the spot where he had previously "defeated" Ino.

 _Now what was the point of saying that out loud? Is he just being flashy on purpose?_ I thought.

But no time for speculation. I wouldn't be understanding this man anytime soon, so there was no point in trying when more important things were going on in the present. The Narutos, and my shadow, had chased Kakashi right where we needed him. Ino would only have a window of about a few seconds to perform the Kawarimi.

It was now or never. A flash of purple from the tree line, and Ino had collided with Kakashi's hip. "Get them, Naruto!" she yelled.

Kakashi jumped in shock. "What?"

But it was too late. The bells were gone.

"I got them, I got them!" Naruto rushed out triumphantly, holding up the little silver bells. "You LOSE, sensei-teme!"

 _It worked! It worked! I can't believe it – my plan actually –_

"Did I?"

The three of us faltered. Kakashi had _that_ smile on his face again.

"You three did well. But it will be a while before you can outsmart me yet."

He disappeared with a _pop_ – as did the bells in our possession.

We stared in silence.

The little red alarm clock hit twelve and started blaring mercilessly.

"How…?"

And then the alarm clock exploded in a puff of smoke, only to reveal none other than Kakashi Hatake, sitting on the wooden stump as happily as a frog in the rain, the real bells jingling from his belt mockingly.

"Unfortunately, I know how to use shadow clones and basic Academy techniques, too."

…

…

…

"HE WAS THE _ALARM CLOCK_ THIS ENTIRE TIME?!"

* * *

 **A/N: Since multiple people have expressed concern over Shikamaru's power level so far, I will admit that I haven't had the time to read the manga past the first phase of the Chunin exams. That means that the baseline I am using comes from the Wave arc.**

 **I won't keep it this boring forever; there are many (I hope) interesting and original skill level-ups I plan to introduce in the future. But they will be most likely be of a different nature from canon, because, as said before, I used the _Naruto_ wikia for everything beyond that.**


	4. The Rusty Kunai

_Genin are so cute,_ Kakashi thought from his stump. Seriously. He almost felt a little bad watching his new team's crestfallen faces.

Almost.

The plan had actually been a good one. And it might have worked, if he hadn't taken the extra step to cheat. Then again, if he hadn't suspected that Shikamaru might have been able to come up with a good plan, he wouldn't have bothered holding himself in a Henge to look like an alarm clock for so long in the first place.

Hey – he _had_ to make it a challenge somehow, and since they had already figured out the whole "no splitting up the teams once they've been formed" rule on the first day, that threw his original setup out the window. Besides, losing to a batch of fresh Genin from the Academy was kind of embarrassing, wasn't it? Even if there _were_ three of them coming at you at once. Plus, staying in one position for all those hours was _not_ easy. Really, _that_ was an amazing accomplishment in and of itself.

Maybe these kids would be good for him. He was their sensei, after all. He _had_ to always be one step ahead of them, at least until they finally reached an age where it was actually socially acceptable for them to surpass him. Though it was a bit embarrassing to admit, Kakashi had sort of slacked off after leaving ANBU. And it wasn't the physical aspect he was referring to – the kill-eat-sleep-train zombie cycle of his teens had _not_ been healthy – it was the mental cycle as well. Though getting away with acting like a complete and utter jerkass _was_ hard work, you could only exercise so much of your mind doing it.

A genius, a mind-reader, and the jinchuuriki of the Nine-Tailed Fox. He wondered just exactly how much _these_ kids would let him get away with.

"So I have good news and bad news," he said.

"Oh, _god_ ," Ino muttered, sliding to the ground. "Please kill me now."

"You don't even know what it is yet," Kakashi said, feigning hurt.

"Bad news first?" Naruto tried.

"First, let me ask you: do you know what the point of this test was?" Kakashi asked them.

They stared at him blankly. "…to see if our skills were up to par?"

"What sort of skills?" Kakashi asked.

"Things."

"What sort of things?"

"Stuff."

 _Ah, crap, Hatake_ , he chided himself. _They're learning._

"How about this: why do you think I only had two bells, and threatened to send one of you back to the Academy?" he tried.

"Reasons?"

"What sort of reasons?"

"Things."

"And what sort of things?"

"Stuff."

Was this how other people normally felt, talking to him?

Oh, well. You learned something new every day.

"Look, just because I'm a Yamanaka doesn't mean I can read minds," Ino said, putting her hands on her hips. She paused. "Well. I meant _your_ mind. Daddy said you're messed up."

Really? Was that what Yamanaka was telling his daughter?

He needed to try harder then. He had been sure the man had called him "totally and irreversibly insane" at his last psych evaluation.

"It was an obvious bluff anyway," Shikamaru muttered. "You're not allowed to split up the teams once they've been formed. You have to pass and fail us together. That's how things work. And even if you _were_ allowed to split us up, the test would still be impossible alone. You're a Jonin. We're Genin. The only reason why you'd give us an impossible challenge is if you wanted us to figure something out."

"Wait – " Naruto interrupted. "So were we or were we not supposed to work together?"

Kakashi sighed, deciding that dancing around the topic was too much of a waste of time. Not that he had much else to do at the moment. "Yes, Naruto. The whole purpose of the test was to see if you guys could work together. Fighting me, defeating me, getting the bells, whatever – that was just a ruse to drive a wedge between you guys. Naturally, since you saw through it before the test even started, it was exceptionally easy for you. The previous teams, on the other hand…"

"Previous teams?" Naruto asked.

"They've been giving me teams for years now, and every year I give the same test, and every year up until now they've all failed. Because they put themselves before the team."

"But why?" Shikamaru asked, baffled. "Surely they realized that it was impossible for them to win in a one-on-one fight? I mean, no offense, Naruto, but even _you_ realized that you couldn't beat him alone after some point, right?"

Naruto shrugged. "Sure, I guess."

Kakashi shrugged. "Not everyone is as smart as you are, Shikamaru. Or maybe they knew, on the inside, but they still thought they had a chance anyway."

"But why would they do that when working together is so much easier?"

"Because unlike you, they actually fell for my lies. They actually thought that one of them would have to go back to the Academy, and so, they turned against their own teammates, instead of the more logical decision – that I, as a stranger and a Jonin, was a more dangerous opponent than their classmates of the same level." Kakashi shrugged. "Plus, you know how they try to balance out the teams. Every year, I'm always the guy that gets the team with the Rookie of the Year and the Dead Last. So there's always that one guy who thinks that he's better than everyone else, therefore simply treats the other two as dead weight. I'm glad to see that you're an exception though, Shikamaru." But, that was expected. Shikaku Nara was a wise man; he wouldn't have spoiled his precious little clan genius into thinking that he was god's gift to man.

"Oh."

Kakashi rubbed his chin. "Now that you mention it, though, that could have happened this year."

"What are you talking about?" Ino asked.

"Sasuke, probably," Shikamaru answered. "You know how he treats Naruto. And the rest of us, actually. But never mind that."

Ino looked at her teammate, and Kakashi saw a flash of guilt flickered across her face. "Oh."

Kakashi smiled at them – and for once it wasn't one of his infamous I-am-trying-to-make-you-angry-on-purpose smiles. It was only day two and they were already infinitely better than he, Rin, and Obito ever were. _Seems like the Academy was actually smart this year and_ didn't _put the two classic rivals together. That would have been hell on earth._

Shikamaru shrugged. "It's okay, Ino. As long as we're on a team together, we won't have to worry about any of that. That means you, too, Naruto."

"Wait," Naruto interrupted. "So does this mean we pass…?"

Kakashi responded cheerfully, "Of course! From now on – "

"HAH! TAKE _THAT_! I, THE GREAT NARUTO UZUMAKI, AM NOW A NINJA! FEAR ME AND MY – _OW_! That _hurt_ , Ino!"

"Stop being so _LOUD_!" Ino scolded him, brushing off the lid of her bento where she had whacked Naruto over the head with it. Shikamaru gave her a sarcastic glance, and started poking at his own box of rice. "But you really mean it? You're our sensei now?"

"That's right. Now eat up. You've already had a long day, and missions start tomorrow."

"YES! MISSIONS! What will it be, Kakashi-sensei? Are we going to be rescuing princesses and – _ow_!"

"They're called _D-ranks_ , Naruto. It's nothing to get excited about," Ino sniffed.

"What's a D-rank?" Naruto asked, rubbing his head.

"Oh my _god_ , Naruto, how can you _not_ know?!" Ino sighed exasperatedly, and Kakashi watched in amusement as she started detailing the entire mission ranking and organization structure to the poor overwhelmed boy. "You have to know this stuff, Naruto! You're on our team now and I won't deal with you slacking off! How do you ever expect to become Hokage if you can't even rank missions? That's a major part of the job description! Do you even know what the Hokage _does_? Or were you asleep for that lesson, too?"

"Uhhh…"

"That's _IT_ , Naruto! As soon as we finish lunch, you are coming to my house and you and I are going to learn _everything_ that you clocked out on during your six years at the Academy, and Shikamaru, I expect you to be there, too, because he's our teammate and I won't have him lagging behind and…"

Kakashi was still smiling as they sauntered away. If they thought _his_ D-ranks were going to be boring, they had another thing entirely coming their way.

* * *

 _The Yamanaka Compound, that afternoon_

Ino didn't know how she was supposed to feel about Naruto. He really was a nice and well-meaning kid, but he was _so annoying_! If Naruto wasn't going to start shaping up sometime soon, they were all going to die. Literally. That boy was going to get himself killed someday.

She would have preferred Choji to Naruto, since Choji actually knew what he was doing. Plus he wasn't so _loud_. Yeah, she knew she could be loud, too, but she wasn't loud _all_ the time like Naruto. And when she yelled she actually had a reason, such as someone being dumb, like Naruto! Not Naruto, who just bragged about becoming Hokage for the heck of it.

But she supposed things could be worse. Sakura was stuck on a team with dogs _and_ bugs. Not that there was anything wrong with dogs, but Kiba was almost as annoying as Naruto and Shino was just… _weird_. He wasn't a bad guy, but he was…yeah, weird was the best way to describe it. With all the – the _bugs_ and stuff. Not good. Ino didn't like bugs. They were creepy.

Meanwhile, the one girl in the world that _wasn't_ in love with Sasuke was the one who got to be on a team with him! How unfair was _that_? Ino wasn't stupid; she saw the way Hinata blushed and sighed at Naruto every day. Now, _why_ she had a crush on Naruto of all people, she didn't know (well, he _was_ kind of cute, but in that annoying-little-brother-that-you-wouldn't-look-twice-at-if-your-mom-didn't-make-you-look-after-him-all-the-time way), but she _did_ know that it was pretty much obvious to everyone except Naruto himself.

Poor girl. And she was too shy to even approach the boy directly. And a direct approach was the only way to get through to a blockhead like Naruto.

In an ideal situation, she would have Sasuke-kun on her team as well, but since she already had Shikamaru, that wouldn't be fair. Shikamaru wasn't too bad. He wasn't dreamy like Sasuke, but he was all right. Objectively speaking he'd be an 7/10. Of course, she couldn't think of him in the same way as she thought of Sasuke, because they were childhood friends and that was just kind of weird, but whatever. Shikamaru was a decent person – kind, respectful, hardworking, and smart. He wouldn't have any trouble finding a girl in the future, and if he did, then Ino would be there to set him up.

To be honest, before their giant fight, she had always imagined Sakura and Shikamaru ending up together. They were really alike, and Sakura was a smart girl once she got over the whole large forehead thing. But _no_ , she just _had_ to go and drive a wedge between them. After all those years of Ino protecting her from Ami and her posse, Sakura just _broke_ their friendship. Over _Sasuke_. Ino had been willing to compromise and set her up with Shikamaru. But no. Sakura refused to settle for anything less than _Sasuke_.

Maybe it was kind of her fault, too. She didn't blame Sakura for wanting to get out under her shadow and find her own way. And she didn't blame Sakura for wanting what she thought to be the best guy to herself. She just wished that they didn't have to become enemies to do it. Maybe a few years down, when times had changed and they got a bit more mature, they'd be able to negotiate over this whole thing again.

Dealing with boys was such hard work.

Ino sighed as she pushed another practice book problem at Naruto. How he made it past first grade she didn't know. He still had trouble reading kanji and performing basic arithmetic – two things that were absolutely required in order to master more complicated jutsu theory later on. Glancing back at Naruto's paper, she realized that he had put as three times four as eighteen.

"You did it wrong!" she yelled. "Four plus four is eight plus four is twelve! It's twelve, not eighteen! Three times _six_ is eighteen!"

"Ugh, okay, okay!" Naruto winced, hastily fixing his answer. "You don't have to bite my head off! Sheesh, what are you, my mother?"

Ino was about to retort to that, when she remembered that Naruto _didn't_ have a mother. Then she realized that everything she knew about reading and writing and math, her mother had taught her. Much of what she learned in the Academy, she had already learned at home beforehand. The Academy spent very little, if any, time on basic reading and writing. When you walked into that classroom, and they started jumping into all that theory and history, they expected you to know all that stuff on your own. And Naruto, of course, knew none of that, because no one had been there for him. No wonder he had so much trouble paying attention. He didn't understand any of the things they were throwing at him.

Now she felt bad for yelling at him all the time.

"…Yeah. That's right. I _am_ your mother," she told him with finality. "NOW BUCKLE DOWN, MISTER! BECAUSE I WON'T HAVE YOU DRAGGING DOWN OUR TEAM JUST BECAUSE YOU DON'T KNOW THAT THREE TIMES FOUR IS TWELVE!"

"GAAAAHHHH! I'M SORRRYYYY!" Naruto wailed.

On the other hand, if that was the only way to get him to concentrate on the important stuff, then she'd yell at him all she wanted.

She was sure that if Naruto's mother, whoever she was, had been alive, she'd be yelling at him just as much, too.

* * *

 _A bar in downtown Konoha, that night_

There wasn't anything particularly special about this place, but it was one of the two favorite hangouts of the Jonin circle of Konoha anyway. Dubbed _The Rusty Kunai_ in faded red paint, the man who ran it apparently was a veteran who had been disabled in the Third Secret War, and as such fellow shinobi and their friends often came by to pay their respects. Since today had been Genin Testing Day, it meant that the place was a bit more crowded than usual, as the younger Chunin and Jonin who hadn't been a part of the Third War dropped by as well to catch up on the latest gossip.

Iruka Umino was one of them. The final team assignments weren't due until tomorrow, and he was dying to know if little Naruto had passed. Apparently the man he had unwittingly assigned the poor kid to was the most ruthless tester of all of them. He hoped that they were all right, though. If what Genma had said was true, then maybe he had a slight advantage. Unless Kakashi Hatake had requested the boy for less-than-friendly reasons.

But no. No self-respecting shinobi would stoop so low as to get petty revenge on a _Genin_ , even if he _was_ the Kyuubi jinchuuriki, right? (He tried not to think of Mizuki.)

Speaking of which, the man had entered the bar now, his tall shock of silver scarecrow-puff clearly standing out against the rest of the dark-haired crowd.

"Hey, Kakashi! How was it?" Asuma Sarutobi – the Sandaime's son; he knew that – asked.

Kakashi shrugged, and there was a collective disappointed groan from the mass of people.

"Oh, not again, Hatake? That makes this, what, the fifth team you've failed?"

Iruka's heart sunk.

"They passed," Kakashi corrected him, sliding onto a stool, and, in the process, pushing Iruka off of it. Slightly stunned at first, and then indignant, he stood up with a disgruntled huff and attempted to reclaim his seat, only to be stopped by another regular.

"This the first time you've been here, kid?"

"One, I have a _name_ , and two, what's it to you?"

"Look, that guy's stolen my seat before, too. Don't bother. It's not going to work. Once he's planted his ass on something he'll be superglued to it until he decides otherwise."

Asuma snickered. Iruka gaped. Kakashi ignored him.

 _WHAT SORT OF JERK_ WAS _THIS GUY?_

The wide-eyed Chunin glanced around the room, trying to find somewhere else to sit, only to realize that there were no empty seats. Probably the reason why Naruto's new teacher had edged him off his own in the first place. He hoped Naruto wouldn't be learning any bad habits from this guy anytime soon. Come to think of it, he actually knew him from his mission reports. Yes, that was right! Kakashi Hatake – the guy who always turned in his mission reports at least three days late and purposefully made them nigh-illegible!

Did this guy exist solely for the purpose of making other people angry?

"Contrary to popular belief," the man interrupted, "I actually _don't_ exist solely for the purpose of making other people angry."

Before Iruka could wrap his mind around that, Asuma Sarutobi had interrupted with a highly sarcastic, " _Really,_ now?"

"Oh, all right," Hatake admitted. "Just _most_ of the time. Which, mind you, is _extremely_ different from _all_ the time."

"Extremely different? Really?"

"Yes. Extremely different. For example: would you rather your heart was beating _all_ the time, or just _most_ of the time?"

"All right. You've got a point there."

"Wait, sorry – did you say you _passed_ a team?" Genma interjected, getting them back on topic. At that moment, the little circles of gossiping shinobi suddenly all merged into one giant conglomerate, centered on their group.

 _Wait – so Naruto had_ passed _?_

"Yep," Kakashi answered them, lifting a bowl of sake to his lips. The atmosphere in the room tensed. Then, just before he was about to take a sip, he paused and lowered the bowl to the collective disappointment of everyone in the room to add, "They actually figured out the trick." He lifted the bowl to his lips again, then paused, and brought it back down. "And they almost got the bells, too." Finally, he reached for his mask, while bringing the bowl up at the same time – before letting go and bringing the bowl back down –

"OH FOR FUCK'S SAKE!" some purple-haired lady in a tan trench coat screamed. She smashed something on the ground – was that a camera? – and stalked out of the bar, fuming.

 _"What's going on?"_ Iruka mouthed to a scarred man standing next to him.

 _"Mask,"_ the man mouthed back. Iruka raised an eyebrow. The man clarified, _"Everyone wants to know what's underneath it, but all he ever does is dick around and lead us on."_

Iruka raised an eyebrow and then returned to his drink. _Whatever. I don't care_ – and paused mid-thought, only to realize that all of a sudden, he _was_ curious now…and damn it! He hadn't had a problem with any of that before _until_ someone had mentioned to him that –

"By the way," Kakashi suddenly said out loud, "did you know that you can actually see your own nose? Your brain just cancels it out automatically. Most people don't even realize it's there until I point it out."

"Huh, you're right," Asuma said, going cross-eyed, as did the rest of the people who heard him. And then three seconds later, " _Dammit_ , Hatake! Now I can't get rid of it!"

Iruka suddenly realized that _yes_ , there _was_ this _thing_ called a _nose_ right in the middle of his field of vision, and _no_ , it _wasn't_ going away.

"Fuck you, Hatake," Genma muttered.

Kakashi Hatake smirked. "You're welcome."

 _"What a jerk,"_ Iruka muttered.

 _"You don't even know half of it."_

Hatake snickered, then brought the bowl back up, only to bring it down again (at this there was an audible groan coming from _everybody_ in the bar), "And before you ask, it's Naruto Uzumaki, Shikamaru Nara, and Ino Yamanaka."

"Oh. That kid. The Nara that actually tried," Genma snickered. "You should have heard the headache Umino had over him."

"I'm right here, you know!" Iruka yelled.

"I know, Umino. That's why I said it."

One of the many Nara family members sighed. "Still don't get why Uncle Shikaku chose Aunt Yoshino of all people."

"And now we see the result of their unholy union."

"So what'd he do?"

"Yeah, Hatake, what did he do?"

"I'm more interested about the Uzumaki boy, myself. Still can't believe he passed."

"He's not a bad kid," Iruka protested. "Troublesome, but not bad."

"Careful with that word, or people will think you're one of us."

Iruka glanced at the random Nara cousin that had just popped up by his side. "…Bad?"

"No, troublesome."

"Maybe he secretly is. He's got the hair for it," another Nara said, poking his ponytail. Iruka hastily ducked out of the way.

"Might as well call the rest of the pineapple heads here; how about that?"

"Oi! Who're you callin' a pineapple head?"

"I'm not calling you anything. Just sayin' that you can't hold your liquor, is all."

"Oh."

"Dammit, Fujaiwa, you're as dumb as an ox."

"What did you say about me?!"

"He said you're as dumb as an ox, Fujaiwa!"

"No I didn't! I said you're as _smart_ as an ox!"

"Oh. Okay. That's better."

It seemed like quite a few patrons had already been here long enough to get just a bit tipsy. One of them stood up and fell over, and had a friend not caught him in time, he would have chipped a few teeth against the floor. As his friend dragged him away, Iruka realized that there was now an open seat, and started edging past the crowd to get to it.

"So how are they?" Asuma asked, scooting backwards a little bit so that Iruka could get to a recently vacated chair. Alas, it was not to be, for just when he had made it past him, someone else had taken the spot, and he was left standing in the middle of the room again.

"They're good kids. They get along. Of course, I'll have to do something about their clothing choice," Kakashi muttered. "Orange. _Orange_. What the hell was the Sandaime thinking, letting him run around in clothes like that? He's already blonde!" He suddenly sat up straight, as he realized, "I've got two blondes on my team, Asuma! They'll stand out like fireflies! Help!"

"I'm sure they'll be fine. You have _white_ hair, and you're still here, aren't you?"

"Yeah, I suppose."

"Sakura has pink hair, if your misery wants company. And she wears red," a woman in a dress of bandages spoke up from behind Asuma. "And all this business with using three different types of conditioner. I don't know what it is with kunoichi these days. All she ever seems to talk about is dieting and looking pretty for boys."

"Ah, yes," Kakashi muttered. "That, too."

"If we're going down that train, then I suppose I should complain about that big red target sign on the back of Sasuke's shirt. He refuses to cover it up, too. Something about his clan and whatnot." Asuma knocked back another shot glass. "Not that the big red swirly mark on the back of our flak jackets are any better, I guess."

"Have you tried telling him that those shirts were only for wear inside the village?" the woman, Kurenai, asked. "Anyone who remembers the Uchiha clan knows that all of them, even Fugaku, covered up on outside missions."

Asuma reached for another shot glass and started complaining something about "stuck-up little Genin who don't know what's good for them." Iruka half-heartedly listened to the newly minted Jonin sensei complain (truthfully, unfortunately) about the young students that he had worked so hard to train. He wondered if he should just move, when just then, another seat opened up, on the other side of the room, near the door. Iruka took this as an answer – yes – and this time, he was determined to get to it before anyone else did.

"To be honest, I'm seriously worried about Sasuke," he could hear Asuma saying. "He's skilled, but he's got terrible team dynamics."

"Is he just antisocial, or does he actually go out of his way to hurt people's feelings?" Kurenai asked. "Because if he's just antisocial…"

"He doesn't do it on purpose, I don't think, but, well. He's blunt. And Hinata's a sensitive girl. He doesn't go out of his way to hurt her on purpose but he definitely makes it clear that he doesn't respect her. He considers Choji to be quite beneath him, too. He works hard to hone his skills, at least, but he doesn't seem to appreciate the fact that his teammates are also doing the same thing…"

At last. Iruka had reached his new seat, and was just about to settle down onto the cushion to relax, when –

"AH! MY GREAT AND ESTEEMED RIVAL! I HEAR RUMORS THAT YOU FINALLY PASSED A GENIN TEAM! IS THIS TRUE? THEN LET US REJOICE! AND ONE DAY OUR TEAMS SHALL COMPETE IN A CONTEST OF YOUTHFULNESS – "

And Iruka Umino found himself wobbling back in his original seat, courtesy of a Kawarimi. The door to the bar was swinging emptily on is hinges.

That _jerkass_.

"Hatake?" Asuma Sarutobi gave him a sympathetic look.

"Hatake," he confirmed.

"MY DEAR AND CHERISHED RIVAL! BUT WHERE ARE YOU GOING?!"

"Cheers," Asuma nodded, pushing a shot glass at him. Iruka took a good, long look at it, and then decided, _what the hell_ , and emptied it.

"You think Naruto will be okay?" Iruka asked, feeling the burn of liquor on his throat.

"Kid, no one in our profession's ever _okay_ ," Asuma replied bitterly. "But yeah, he'll be okay."

* * *

 **A/N: So I did the math this time! Kakashi joined ANBU shortly after the Obito mission, so he was 13. He was in ANBU for ~10 years according to the Naruto wikia, so inclusive that would be until he was 22. From there, up until age 26 (remember, we're using inclusive years) that would be 5 teams.**


	5. It's All About That Money

**A/N: If you have anything specific you'd like to see in the bonuses, let me know.**

* * *

BONUS #2:

 _Kakashi-sensei Plays Super Smash Bros._

"Why the hell are you picking Jigglypuff? Jigglypuff sucks! Super slow, zero reach, and the special attack does more harm than good. It's _literally_ a freaking _marshmallow_."

*Twenty games later*

"He just won. Again. With _Jigglypuff_. _Again_."

"…How?"

"Three words: killer aerial acceleration."

* * *

 _About one month later_

"Children~" Kakashi called. "I have a new mission for you~"

"What is it this time? Did you steal Tora and dump him in the middle of the Forest of Death – I mean, did Tora get 'lost' in the Forest of Death, _again_?" Ino asked exasperatedly. Ah, yes. That had been a standard retrieval mission.

"Better than that time we had to babysit that kid, and poorly balanced kunai towers randomly appeared next to him every time we even blinked," Naruto said. Well, how _else_ were they supposed to learn how to guard someone properly? Important officials and rich merchants attracted as much trouble as babies did.

"Or that time we had to repair some house, except he _kept throwing rocks at us_ ," Ino added. Yeah, that was a fun one. You never knew when you might have to build strategic outposts while under fire.

"Or dealing with the Earth-Style Headhunter Jutsu when we were trying to plant _leech-infested_ rice paddies." Well, that might have been a bit excessive, but at least Naruto was no longer orange after that, right?

"And remember when he made us barter for groceries in the farmers' market with all those angry fishwives instead of the store like normal people where things are actually arranged in an organized fashion?" But of course! It was part of their culture, for god's sake. No self-respecting ninja went through life without learning how to extract every single penny from each transaction.

"And don't even remind me of when he made us walk the long way around Konoha to get to a shop that was literally thirty feet away from where we started!" Well, patience was a virtue – and as shinobi, it was important that they learn to grit their teeth and follow orders, even if it seemed completely stupid.

"Two words: _rice cakes_ ," Shikamaru interjected, joining in, and Ino and Naruto both nodded vigorously in agreement.

Ah, yes. _Rice cakes._ Okay, so _that_ had just been to mess with them…but it was still fun.

"I bet we have to clean someone's pool, and so he's going to tie us to bricks and chuck us in there just to see how long it would take us to escape." Yeah, he had _just_ been planning that, actually – wait, how'd they know?

"Now that's very hurtful," Kakashi interrupted them. "I am offended that you would even suggest that I would do something like that to you. And after all the trouble I had gone through to procure a C-rank for you. Oh, well, I guess I should just take this back – "

"NO NO NO NO it's fine!" Ino hastily amended.

"I don't know…"

"Please please please please _please_ sensei?" Naruto whined.

Kakashi grinned evilly behind his mask.

Normally, he would have trained his Genin team, well, _normally_. Only, this was no longer a frontline combat team. Team Ten was now the frontline combat team. They were, instead, a capture and interrogation team. And all of Kakashi's experiences in capture and interrogation had been from ANBU.

So naturally, this team received some rather _special_ training.

Nothing unreasonable, though! Honestly! All he did was expand their non-Academy jutsu repertoires to something more than just the Shadow Clone, Mind Transfer, and Shadow Possession.

And retrain Naruto in chakra control.

And give Shikamaru another shogi opponent besides his dad.

And cover Ino up with a little more armor.

("Honey, the only ugly girl is a dead one; now _put some pants on!_ ")

The point was, everything he had done up until this point had been perfectly logical.

…Except for maybe those times when he kidnapped the Fire Daimyo's wife's cat and threw it into a variety of terrains just to make them catch it (what better way to simulate a tracking mission in safe simulated conditions than with a pet that fought back?) – various training grounds, the woods, a random field of nothing but desert brush, a river crossing full of floating logs, a mountain cave system, a mazelike canyon, the red light district…

He had gotten a real kicker out of that last one. Especially when they brought him in just so he could explain to the Hokage that one day his students might have track a target into unfamiliar urban territory. After all, not all rogue shinobi hid out in the wild. Many of them _had_ to venture back into human centers every once in a while to trade for supplies, after all.

Now _that_ was an excuse he was particularly proud of. He'd stash it up there with "I got lost on the road of life."

He didn't get why the Hokage had been so mad at him. It was thanks to him that Konoha got all that extra money and missions. Everyone won, except Tora, but Tora didn't count because Kakashi hated it.

"Just kidding. It's a D rank. You're cleaning someone's pool. And I actually _wasn't_ going to tie you to bricks," – okay, he _was_ – "but now that you mention it, that seems like a great idea – "

"WAAAAH! I'M SORRRRYYYYY!"

Speaking of C-ranks, though…maybe they really _were_ ready for one.

* * *

 _The Road to Suna_

"We'll set up camp here," Kakashi-sensei said, holding up his left fist at a right angle. Shinobi sign language for stop – at least, in Konoha anyway. Every hidden village had its own set of rules. However, we wouldn't be learning them before becoming fluent in this one first. "Ino, you catch dinner; you need to improve your field work skills. Naruto, you scout out the area. We'll give you a little tactical test when you come back. And Shikamaru, stay here and set up the tents. When you're done, start practicing the jutsu I taught you. I suggest you enjoy the forest while you can," he said, shooting a look at Ino. "Tomorrow we're heading out into the desert toward Suna. Go."

One month ago, Ino would have whined at being forced to venture out into the forest alone. Now, she simply picked up her weapons pack without a single word and leaped off into the bushes silently. She still cared about her looks, but she never made mention of it when Kakashi-sensei was around. His method of dealing with her, every time she complained about her clothes or hair, had been to respond by dousing her with a water jutsu and then kicking up as much dust and dirt around her as he could while she flailed and screamed.

It didn't matter if we were out in a training field or in the middle of Konoha. "Accidents" happened all the time, and compared to some of the other things he had made us do, getting Ino muddy was the least of our concerns.

Naruto, I found, was naturally hardheaded and didn't know when to give up, while Ino, as always, enjoyed walking at the front and dragging people along. So while they whined and cried, they still managed to complete all the tasks that Kakashi-sensei set forth. The other alternative had been to train with Team Gai for the day instead, and we all learned what that meant the hard way the first time we tried.

Kakashi-sensei seemed really fond of drilling lessons into us "the hard way."

Really, if I had been born with my father's work ethic instead of my mother's, I would not have survived the first week with these people.

"Make sure you cover your tracks well this time," I yelled after Ino.

"Yeah, yeah, I remember the last time I forgot well enough, thank you very much," I heard her snap back.

"Sheesh, the way you guys go on and on about it, you'd think that you _didn't_ enjoy being attacked in the middle of the night and tied upside-down to a tree while the rest of your belongings were strewn about," Kakashi-sensei said.

"Yes, I'm sure that's a very popular thing people do for fun," I replied sarcastically.

"I believe they call them 'scavenger hunts'. It's fun. Little kids do it at birthday parties," Kakashi-sensei told me.

"They don't tie them upside-down to trees, though," I pointed out.

"Well, obviously, we're ninja, so we have to make it a little harder, right?"

I chose not to answer that question. Arguing with crazy people was not very conducive to my mental health, and as far as I was concerned, Kakashi Hatake was one of those people who could literally drive you crazy without any effort whatsoever. Not that I'd leave his tutelage even if I could; there was no denying that he was just as brilliant as he was insane. Sometimes I wondered which one he was – brilliant, or insane. Or perhaps both.

"Yes, funny how well those two things go together," Kakashi-sensei said out of the blue.

"What?"

"Being brilliant and being insane. Two sides of the same coin, really. If the scheme succeeds, it's brilliant; if it fails, it's insane. The important thing is to make sure no one can tell if you've planned this all out, or if you're just making it up as you go along." He had seated himself on a thick tree branch and was swinging his legs idly.

I paused, still halfway through setting up the tent. For some reason, there had been a sack of raw sunflower seeds hidden in the tent bag. I would have attributed it to Ino, being from a family of florists, except that normal people just didn't store sunflower seeds in tent bags.

I looked up at Kakashi-sensei, who gave me a completely innocent look back.

"…Did I say that out loud?"

"Did you say what out loud?"

"Being brilliant and being insane." Still staring at the sunflower seeds, I shrugged and tossed them over to the roadside.

"What about it?"

"Why did you suddenly give me a definition out of the blue? Did I ask for it?"

He turned his head to the side. "No?"

"…So why did you suddenly give me a definition out of the blue?"

"I wasn't aware that you needed a reason to suddenly give people a definition out of the blue."

 _That_ was a regular conversation.

…Aaand this is why I don't start arguments with him.

"Want to play a game of chess?"

"No. One, we don't have a board, and two, you cheat." And three, I doubted he even knew all the rules. The last – and only – time I tried, he had tried to get away with turning his rooks upside-down while insisting that a deck of cards was necessary to play the game. In his words, since people in real life rarely followed the rules, it was incentive for him to do the same in board games. Which, I supposed was true enough, but all the same, I didn't think it was possible to suddenly summon a rain of flaming rocks into the middle of a battlefield in real life.

Then again, that sounded exactly like the sort of stupid thing he'd do for shits and giggles.

"One, I do _not_ cheat, and two, flaming rocks are the stupidest and most inefficient way ever to kill someone."

"I didn't say anything about flaming rocks."

"You were thinking it, though."

I frowned. "How'd you know?"

"So you really _were_ thinking about flaming rocks?" He grinned. "I was just guessing, but thanks for confirming it."

I groaned.

"One game, Shikamaru. And I promise not to cheat."

"We don't even have a board."

"We don't need a board to play," he said, smiling. "Pawn to e4."

"Pawn to e5. Didn't you want me to practice the new ninjutsu you taught me?" I asked, shoving the last tent pole into place.

"It's called multitasking, Shikamaru. I know you can play games like this in your sleep," he said, flipping open his book. "Knight to f3."

"Knight to c6," I said, and started summoning rock pikes from the dirt. I was an Earth type, which suited me well, since it was the best element to form shadows with. Ino, on the other hand, was a fire type – surprisingly, or maybe not – and Naruto was a wind type. Kakashi-sensei himself was a lightning type, although he could manipulate any other element except wind.

We verbally sparred back and forth for a few more minutes, until Kakashi-sensei snapped his book shut and jumped down from his branch. "Checkmate."

I frowned. "You cheated."

"Did not."

"Yes you did," I deadpanned, tracing our moves backwards. Your second-to-last move used a knight from f6. That wasn't a knight. That was _my_ rook."

"Oh, did I? Well, too bad. You should have called me out on it the very moment I did it." He started walking around my earth pikes, kicking them to test their strength. They didn't break; I knew they would not. The first time he had taught me this technique a week ago, I could only compact the earth enough to create a crumbly mess. I had practiced it every day since then.

"I would have beaten you if you hadn't done that," I pointed out. "I was one move away from checkmate."

"Well, then, that's a very good reason for me not to fight fair, isn't it?" he asked.

"Like I said: cheater."

"Shinobi," he corrected.

I glared at him. He looked back at me pseudo-innocently, with his one visible eye.

"That only works if you're five," I told him.

"Actually, I was born on a leap year, so technically, I'm six," he retorted.

"No you weren't. You were born on September 15th."

"September 15th on a leap year."

"That's not how it works…oh, never mind. I know better than to get into an argument with you, sensei."

"That wasn't an argument. We were having a friendly conversation."

I declined to answer, and simply kept molding my stone pikes until Ino and Naruto came back and took their share of dealing with our incorrigible teacher. Rock was much more unyielding than shadows, but the principle was the same. Theoretically, with a bit more practice, I could be making walls and domes with the earth, too, from this very same set of hand seals. Of course, there were probably easier and more efficient methods available, just by memorizing a slightly different set of seals, but it was nice, knowing that I could.

The trip to Suna lasted without much incident, other than Kakashi-sensei's regular behavior – which I think was erratic enough that the gods took pity on us and decided to leave the normal problems for later. For once, Kakashi-sensei didn't chide Ino on trying to keep what semblance of her magazine-model behavior she had left. Though she had no time to apply makeup or brush her hair out in the field, she _had_ thought ahead far enough to bring along sunscreen and face scarves for the rest of us. It didn't change the fact that the harsh climate of Suna was way different from Konoha's milder weather, but at least it made the transition easier.

Our mission was simple on paper – we were to escort a merchant to Tanyu, the capital of Hi no Kuni, guard him for a week while he did his trading, and then escort him back. Not the standard Capture and Interrogation thing that our team was built for, but it was still important that we familiarized ourselves with various mission types anyway. Come to think of it, that was probably why Kakashi-sensei purposefully made all of our D-ranks way more difficult than they should have been.

In reality, though, the general attitude in Suna was just as welcoming as its weather – that is to say, not very. Though it could hardly be attributed solely to the unfriendly nature of the people. After all, since we had arrived at the gate, Kakashi-sensei had done nothing but cause trouble and expect us to clean it up. That had included flirting with the gate guard there in an attempt to get out of paying the entrance fee and almost succeeding until a man that was either her brother or boyfriend came back out and tried to kill him for it, only for the woman to slap him for being rude to a guest, and that had just erupted into a massive brawl.

From the looks of things they were _still_ cleaning up, and one or two people would be facing some demerits after that particular incident.

Kakashi-sensei, on the other hand, had gotten away scot-free. I think he still hadn't paid the entrance fee, either.

I wondered what he was going to do with the extra money. It wasn't even that much. From the open record mission books, I knew that Kakashi-sensei had been on a massive number of A-ranks, not to mention dozens of unlisted S-ranks – and those both paid _extremely_ well. _One_ S-rank was enough to cover room, board, and meals for an apartment in the nice part of town for several months, and he had disappeared from the official mission record book for _ten years_ (either a sign of being a missing-nin or ANBU, and they didn't let missing-nin teach Genin unless their heads were detached from their shoulders first). Judging from his sparse hobbies and limited wardrobe, it could be said that my teacher was a frugal person by nature. That didn't even include his ridiculous skill in deception – he was the type to walk out of a casino richer than he walked in, every time. Unless he was a drug addict…but no, not even drugs could explain, well, the blip in reality that was Kakashi Hatake _._

It could very well be that he was just completely barking mad, and, like everything else, was just doing what he did to cause trouble for the sake of trouble.

"You know," Kakashi-sensei said loudly as we passed a tea shop, "I really feel bad for girls who go out on dates with boys simply because they feel sorry for them."

We followed his line of sight to the lone young couple in the shop, and, sure enough, on closer inspection, the girl _really, really_ looked like she didn't want to be there. And now that they had both heard Kakashi-sensei's statement…

("But – so – ")

("I'm sorry. I didn't want to hurt your feelings…")

("So you _don't_ like me?")

Things just got very, very awkward.

"Sensei, that wasn't very _nice_ ," Ino snapped.

"Well, think about it this way. The girl wouldn't have said anything otherwise. The boy would go home thinking that she really liked him. Then he'd try asking her out again. And she'd just keep leading him on to be polite. And then he gets himself all pumped up over nothing – and when she says, 'Sorry, I don't actually love you' – then it's just a ton of chaos. Instead, I'm saving _her_ the time and boredom, and _him_ the massive resulting heartbreak – what's cruel about that?"

"But – it's not _polite –_ "

"We're shinobi. We're never polite – unless it suits us."

"Like flirting with girls half your age in front of their boyfriends?" she asked drily.

"Ino, if she was half my age, she'd be your age plus one, and that would make me a pedophile, which I am not," Kakashi-sensei replied.

Naruto blurted out, "But we're twelve!"

"Actually, in Jupiter years, I'm only…"

"But your hair's all white!" Naruto protested.

"…Am I really that wrinkly-looking? Because that's just the mask; it really is."

"No, but your hair's white! Like, whiter than the old man Hokage! Even he has some brown hair left. How'd your hair get so white?"

"…I was born with white hair, Naruto."

"Oh."

"But that's neither here nor there. Here's our client. Hello, Gyoza-san."

Gyoza-san was a portly old man with a thin walrus moustache and an array of gold rings on his fingers that looked fake. The ryo in his money pouch, however, were not, and considering his fear and deference toward even Naruto, it seemed that he wouldn't be double-crossing us anytime soon. Most merchants did not. There was a fifty-fifty chance of getting caught when swindling civilians, and the punishment would be a fine or maybe jail time. Shinobi, on the other hand, were truthfully rumored to be less forgiving.

By the time we got back to the front gate of Suna, Kakashi-sensei had caused no less than four additional arguments – five if you counted him "accidentally" dropping and spilling a bag of birdseed right in front of a flock of highly aggressive pigeons just so they'd fight over it – and we were almost glad to be out of that infernal place.

"Do you _always_ do that?" I asked him.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

"Causing arguments. For fun."

"I didn't do anything. They were the ones choosing to argue, not me."

That only got him nasty looks from the new Chunin on duty. Evidently mission control had learned from the first time, because instead of the girl from before there were two large, burly, scarred, ultra-masculine, war-hardened veterans glaring down at all the passers-by.

Of course, the fact that we were dealing with a pair of alpha males instead of a dreamy teenage girl didn't stop Kakashi-sensei, who simply pulled down his mask (while facing away from us, unfortunately), winked, and walked away, once again, without paying a single cent.

"How did you _do_ that?" Naruto asked, rubbing his own face.

"I'm special," Kakashi-sensei grinned.

"You couldn't have just forked over the coins?" Ino asked.

Kakashi-sensei clapped his hands together. "Well, when you pay, see, they make a note of the date and your identity so that they know who paid when, and I don't like my name floating around for people to track down."

"Sensei, you do realize that you have a very distinctive appearance, and that if someone was really looking for you, they wouldn't bother with the Suna travelers' ledger," Ino tried.

"But they still wouldn't know the exact date, and now, neither will they," Kakashi-sensei said, gesturing in the general direction of the Kazekage dome. "Which leads to _my_ questions for _you_ three now: why?"

"Why what, Sensei?" Naruto asked.

"Why do you think I didn't give out my name?"

"Because we're shinobi from another village, and they might not like us?" Ino suggested.

"But why wouldn't they? We are allies, aren't we?" he said.

" _Allies_ ," Ino responded, making quotation marks in the air with her fingers. "In politics, there are no permanent friendships, just permanent interests. You said so youself."

"Quite right, Ino. But there's a deeper reason for this animosity. Currently, Suna dislikes _us_ in particular, even more than Iwa, which arguably caused them more damage than we did in the last war. Why?"

Ino gave him a dubious look.

Kakashi-sensei glared at her. "Your lack of faith in me is astounding. Besides, I meant Konoha in general, not just me."

"Money," I spoke up. "I saw their rates at the front gate. Their services are way more expensive than ours are. That's why this Suna merchant, who should be hiring Suna nin, is instead willing to wait an extra day for a team from Konoha to come instead. We're stealing their jobs."

"Exactly," said Kakashi-sensei. "It's not just this one merchant, either. The Daimyo of the Land of Wind is also outsourcing missions – of the top secret variety – to Konoha shinobi. Also, something important for you three to know: it's not just the cheaper rates. It's also the advertising and PR. Konoha is unique in that we spend a great deal of effort in maintaining our squeaky clean image. You really don't think our village is a land of nothing but smiles and laughter, do you?"

Ino faltered.

"We have ANBU and assassination missions, too. Some of the things we do are just as nasty as the rest of the Hidden Villages. We're just better at faking the façade of being the 'nice' village. Really, the only difference between us and them is that so far, we haven't been the direct cause of a hidden war just yet. The last three all came from Suna-Iwa-Kiri territory disputes," Kakashi-sensei explained.

"Sensei, just how bad is it?" Ino asked. "This…money war, I mean."

"Officially, the financial statements of each hidden village are private information, so I know nothing, and neither does the rest of Konoha. Behind closed doors…while our mission rate has grown about 30% in the past few years, theirs has dropped about 40%."

"Well, that's not good," Naruto scratched his head. "This won't end well, will it? Shouldn't we tell someone about this?"

Kakashi-sensei chuckled mirthlessly. "You think the Hokage doesn't already know? Believe me, he's been aware of this from the very beginning. Taking advantage of it, in fact."

Naruto wrinkled his nose. "But…if they hate us…"

Kakashi-sensei sighed. "What do you suggest we do, Naruto? Raise our prices just to placate another less competitive village? A shinobi village is a business first and foremost, Naruto. If you want to be Hokage you'll have to understand that. This is as fair as it gets."

"But what if they do something backhanded to us because of…" Naruto trailed off. "You know. Poor people get desperate."

"And what makes you think that they won't do the same thing, even if they are prosperous?"

"Well, because there's no point, right? I mean, trying to cheat someone else is a gamble, and if you get caught, things can get really bad…but if they're desperate enough that any payoff is worth it…" Naruto scratched the back of his neck. "I don't know much about politics, but I've been poor before. When I ran out of money I'd always go to Hokage-jii-san and ask for some more, but these guys can't do that, right? Is forty percent a lot?"

"Forty percent is almost half, Naruto," Ino said.

"Oh."

"Are you worried that Suna will try to attack or sabotage Konoha over a forty percent mission drop, Naruto?" Kakashi-sensei drawled quietly from behind his book.

"I…I don't know. Do you think it'll happen? Because if it's not going to happen, then I won't have to worry, will I?" Naruto said.

"What do you think, Shikamaru?" Kakashi-sensei asked.

I frowned. "I don't know what they will do. But if this goes on, then yes, they'll definitely do something. It depends on our income curve. If we raise our prices, will that cover for the amount of missions we lose?"

"What if I told you that, hypothetically, our prices are very carefully determined and set by a board of highly trained accountants, and that what we are charging right now is _the_ optimal price, no questions asked?" Kakashi-sensei whispered. "And, hypothetically, what if this situation was real? Would you sacrifice some of Konoha's income, in anticipation for dealing with damages from Suna that may or may not come? You saw the sign at their front gate. Even if we raised our prices a little, people would still come to us. Matching our prices with Suna, even temporarily, will result in a greater loss of money than they could ever deal us in war reparations. What would you do, if you were the Hokage?"

Naruto swallowed, and finally answered, "Keep smiling and pretend nothing's wrong."

Kakashi-sensei let his one eye coast over us slowly.

"Image is the second most important thing to survival. Remember that. First determinant is what you _know_ of yourself. The second is what others _think_ of you. Everyone wears a mask."

"Like you?" I couldn't help asking.

"Yes," Kakashi-sensei answered. I had expected another half-lie at best, but his self-satisfied smirk told a completely different story entirely. "Yes, exactly like me."

Then the little truth I saw was gone, completely wiped off his face by an infuriating smile hidden behind _Icha Icha Paradise_.


	6. Tanyu

Tanyu was huge. Massive. We had never seen a city this big before. Growing up in a Hidden Village usually meant growing up with the mentality that said sphere of influence was the center of the world. It was even easier to fall for it when one lived in Konoha – the largest of the main five. Seeing the capital of the Land of Fire, however, was a grim reminder of reality – that Konoha's special status as a sovereign city-state only existed as a result of a delicate balancing game with the Daimyo of the Land of Fire and his troops.

It made sense that the Fire Daimyo had military forces outside of Konohagakure no Sato – the Land of Fire was the most populous of the five Elemental Nations, just as Konoha was the most populous of the five main Hidden Villages. They couldn't rely on a (relatively) tiny city of shinobi alone to man _all_ of their borders. The army of the Daimyo was probably large enough to raze Konoha to the ground, if they all marched against us in their entirety.

Of course, such a conflict wouldn't come without major costs to both parties. Despite our numbers, we'd be able to inflict some major damage against the regular soldiers, too. It was said that one shinobi, even a Genin, was worth ten soldiers; the good ones could probably wipe out entire formations singlehandedly. And just because a village was destroyed, didn't mean that shinobi could be defeated. Ideals survived longer than people, and all it would take was one vengeful ANBU to escape the carnage...and the next time the Daimyo went to sleep…

The same worked in reverse, though. If we overstepped a certain bound of insubordination, then, ninja village or not, the whole Land of Fire would turn against us, in economic if not military-based revenge.

For now, though, our relations with our Daimyo seemed friendly enough, considering that his wife was always at the mission desk every other weekend. The same could not be said for Suna and the Wind Daimyo, and I wondered if higher pricing was the only thing that was causing the Wind Daimyo to outsource missions to Konoha. Had they offended him in the past, somehow?

But of course, neither of them were stupid enough to attack each other, and so using another Hidden Village as a scapegoat was the next best thing.

Still, the sheer size and number of people in Tanyu was quite overwhelming. And it was then that I also realized that while normal people might fear shinobi, they really didn't think twice about us as individuals. Though the Hidden Villages were actually a misnomer, since by now they were large enough for easy access, most people had never actually dealt with our "sort" personally – as far as they were concerned, we were our own separate little world.

"People don't trust us, do they?" Ino asked. Even though the streets were packed full of people, we never seemed to have any problems with personal space. It didn't matter that Ino, Naruto, and I were all still only children. One look at our forehead protectors, and everyone, from noble to street rat, went scurrying in the opposite direction.

It wasn't so much that they were afraid we'd stab them in the middle of this open street, seeing as we were walking around with our faces exposed (except Kakashi-sensei) – but Ino was right. Shinobi made a living off lies and deceit. I didn't blame them for keeping their distance. Though all the same I don't think it protected them very well from the likes of Kakashi Hatake.

"We shinobi live secret lives. Travelers and such interact with us commonly, so they know what we _do_ , but unless you've actually lived in a Hidden Village, you wouldn't know _how_ ," Kakashi-sensei explained, sporting an odd, ugly-looking red fez hat that hadn't been there before. Reaching up, he removed it from his head and immediately foisted it off on the next closest person walking past us. "Things you take for granted, like sticking to walls or jumping from tree to tree, are magnificent feats of strength for these people. When people say 'shinobi' they think of boogeymen, of inhuman creatures that live in the shadows and only come out to slit your throats at night."

I snorted. "So ANBU." There was a loud crash, and I didn't even have to turn to realize that whoever Kakashi-sensei had stolen the hat from had collided with the person he had disposed of it on.

Kakashi-sensei shrugged. "Yes and no. We generally don't assign assassination missions to kids under eighteen, unless you're a special case like Itachi Uchiha, and of course look where that got us. Still, remember that you're all trained killers. If you can hit a target with a kunai, then you can hit a person, too."

Ino paled. "But…what if I'm not that type of person? What if I'm more of a spying shinobi instead of a killing shinobi?"

"Well, then, one day you might make a mistake, and someone will catch you. At that point, you can either slit his throat before he raises the alarm, or get _your_ throat slit because you knew how to use a knife but was too squeamish to do it," Kakashi-sensei remarked flippantly.

Ino didn't say much after that.

"…Do they really hate us that much?" Naruto asked, watching a mother push her child over to her other side as she kept an eye on the four of us warily.

"Hate? Not really. They simply don't understand us. And what people don't understand, people fear. Very few people have knowledge of what we can really do. They only hear exaggerated tales from the grapevine, further amplified and darkened by the aura of mystery that surrounds us. Which, as you know, is completely unfounded, because literally anyone can walk into the Academy on a sunny summer day and sign up their kid for next year's class."

"I don't like being judged," Naruto said moodily, shoving his hands into his pockets.

"Well, get used to it, because that's the way the world spins. You might as well use it to your advantage. Besides, don't take it personally. Look at all the people in this city. You're one out of a million. People really won't care enough to remember you for a bad reason unless you give them a good reason to." At this, he tapped the right shoulder of a man who had been unfortunate enough to walk in front of us, and quickly sidestepped to his left when the man turned his head. There was a muffled _thump_ and some indignant yelling; evidently, the man he had tricked had accidentally run into a display case while he hadn't been looking forward, if the trinkets strewn about the street were any indication.

"But we already have a reason, don't we?" Naruto asked. "We're _ninja_."

"Just because you're a ninja doesn't automatically mean that people will _care_. And if they do, then it's certainly not about you as a person," said Kakashi-sensei. "You _do_ realize that no one here even _cares_ that the Shinobi World Wars even _happened_ , right?"

Naruto was flabbergasted. "But…even _I_ know that. And I ditched half the days at the Academy, at least."

Kakashi-sensei shrugged. "It's amazing, isn't it? How little people know about things that don't affect them directly? You look at all those names carved into the Memorial Stone, and think of how many more were left widowed, orphaned, and friendless, and all for what? It doesn't matter to any of these people. All of the fighting in those secret wars took place on rough terrain far from these urban centers. It was always our sphere. Never theirs. Oh, thank you."

"What?"

Kakashi-sensei shrugged, holding up a misshapen package wrapped in brown tissue paper. "Someone just gave this to me."

"Did they actually hand it to you, or did it merely 'exchange hands' when you bumped into that person?" Ino asked, hands on her hips.

Kakashi-sensei folded back the corner of the paper to peek inside. From my angle, I couldn't see very clearly, but it looked like some kind of cloth, light blue in color with leafy flower patterns. "It was just an accident. I'll be giving this back."

"I suppose you would have said 'they gave it to me' had it been the latest copy of that book you always read?" Ino asked.

"Now, would I ever do something like that?"

"Yes," the three of us answered simultaneously.

"Youngsters are so disrespectful nowadays," Kakashi-sensei sighed.

 _"How are we going to survive here for the whole week again?"_ Ino mouthed to me.

I shrugged. _"Just close your eyes and pretend it's all a bad dream."_

"Yeah, one called REALITY," she sniffed.

"What was that?" Kakashi-sensei asked.

"Nothing," she said quickly.

"It sure sounded like something."

"It was nothing. Honestly."

He stopped in the middle of major intersection, completely ignorant of the fact that he was now blocking traffic in the busiest square in Tanyu, to level Ino with a deadpan stare. "You're a very bad liar, Ino. We'll have to fix that."

Ino wrinkled her nose defiantly. "I don't know what you're talking about."

"Better. But you have to sound more dismissive of others' opinions when you lie. That way they not only start questioning your dishonesty, but also their own version of the truth," he said, flipping his book back open – and, without changing his walking pace, also blindsiding two horse-drawn carts at once so that they ended up swerving and barely missing each other.

 _"Did he actually plan that or was it just an accident?"_ Naruto whispered.

 _"I wouldn't be surprised if Chaos was a physical entity strapped to the bottom of his sandals,"_ said Ino, giggling.

Strangely enough, while Kakashi-sensei was completely deaf to the earth-shattering curses that the cart drivers were throwing in our direction, he managed to hear our whispers among the cacophonous crowd perfectly fine, because about two minutes later he had his revenge by disappearing off into thin air and leaving us stranded in the middle of an unfamiliar metropolis with nothing but our backpacks and the man we were supposed to guard.

Luckily, he had done this before, when we were on that mission tracking Tora down in Konoha's slums, so we were prepared to do our own navigation. And while we were extremely annoyed at Kakashi-sensei's antics (who wouldn't be?), we also remembered our lesson. When we had gotten news of the C-rank the previous week, we had also gotten mission parameters dictating that we would be spending several days in areas that were very easy to get lost – or temporarily abandoned – in. As soon as that meeting had ended, the three of us had gone straight to the map corner of the library to research the most recently updated diagrams of Suna and Tanyu, and the trails connecting them to each other and to Konoha.

"…Where's the Jonin?" the merchant suddenly asked, looking around.

Ino smiled cheerfully and pointed off in a random direction where Gyoza-san's nearsighted eyes couldn't follow. "He's right there, sir." (No, he wasn't.) "It's a standard scouting procedure." (No, it wasn't.) "He'll be back soon enough." (No, he wouldn't.)

"Oh. All right. You kids – er," the man cleared his throat uncomfortably, "you people – do you know your way around this city?"

"I have the road plans memorized, sir," I told him smoothly. This wasn't a lie, at least. "You and your goods are safe with us. Right, Naruto?"

"Mmm-hmmm!" Naruto grinned foxily. "No one's going to be robbing you while we're around; believe it!"

At our confidence-inspiring speeches, our client relaxed visibly. "All right. If you say so."

 _"Did we just lie to our own client?"_ Ino whispered.

 _"_ Excuse _me, but it is called_ 'bluffing' _, my cute students,"_ Naruto whispered back, imitating Kakashi-sensei. _"There's a_ difference _."_

 _"Bullshit,"_ I called.

Ino turned her giggle into a cough.

Eventually, despite Kakashi-sensei's absence – or rather, because of it, since he was no longer around to congest traffic – we managed to deliver the client to his hotel on schedule. When we carried his bags up to his room, however, Kakashi-sensei was already there waiting for us –

Just kidding. It was a scarecrow. There was a note tacked to its front. Naruto snatched it off.

" _My cute students_ ," he read slowly, " _I am afraid that I have gotten lost on the road of life again. Please find me before the end of the week, as the Fire Daimyo will be throwing a festival to honor his late father and movement through the streets will be close to impossible._ "

"WHAT?" Ino yelled, grabbing the paper from Naruto and rereading it carefully. "That _JERK_! Why _here_ , of all places? This is the largest city in all of the Elemental Nations! It'll be _impossible_ to find him even with a time limit of a week!"

"Is there a problem?" Gyoza-san asked, scratching his head.

"No, sir," Ino growled, crumpling the note in her fist. There was a spark of a fire jutsu, and the paper ignited, smoking and shriveling like what remained of our hopes of having a semi-pleasant stay in Tanyu. Throwing the ashes to the floor, she ground the dust into the wooden boards with the heel of her sandal and stalked off.

"…Is she okay?" Gyoza-san asked, shaking. After all, normal twelve-year-old girls didn't set papers on fire with only their breath just because they were angry.

"Sir, we're shinobi. We're never okay," I deadpanned.

"But at least we'll do our best to make sure _you_ are, right?" Naruto added, cheerful and morally upright as always. This seemed to placate him, and he retired for the night.

"How the hell are we supposed to do this?" Ino whined. "In our contract, we're supposed to be keeping an eye on Gyoza-san for the whole week as he does his business! How are we supposed to guard him _and_ look for Kakashi-sensei at the same time?"

"Well, I guess we should have seen this coming, what with him disappearing and all," I said. He _had_ played this version of I-Spy-Hide-And-Seek with us before – but never like this. Usually we'd have set boundaries like a certain range of blocks in Konoha or a certain expanse of forest. Never before had we had to search something as huge as the entire city of Tanyu, and never before had he put us at a whole half-hour disadvantage as he did now, seeing as he had abandoned us back at that square. "At least we have Naruto's clones, right?"

"I can make enough to search this whole city, if you need me to," Naruto said, puffing out his chest proudly.

"You do that. Have your clones send you a signal if they see something. Ino and I will keep observation watch." The way Kakashi-sensei played this particular game, if we didn't find him before time was up – and that was always, because it was basically impossible to find Kakashi-sensei if he didn't want to be found (unless your name was Maito Gai) – he'd give us a quiz on various random details instead, such as "Was the lady with the bright red bird-shaped hairpin traveling with a man or a woman?" or "Was that last question a trick question and was she actually traveling with both a man and a woman, or was she traveling alone?". The quiz would last until we got three questions right – one each – and every question we got wrong in the meantime was a day spent fulfilling one of Maito Gai's challenge requests.

I was mostly fine with it, because the challenges _were_ good training, even if they were crazy, and Naruto was also mostly fine with it, because TenTen didn't hit him like Sakura did or boss him around like Ino did.

Ino, however, would do _anything_ to avoid these days. Something about too much youthfulness and Lee not knowing when to give up. Lee had a massive and borderline-obsessive crush on her, which she did not reciprocate. And all of her efforts to look less pretty only served to intensify his admiration for her, because apparently, girls that walked around in baggy camouflage and tight braids were deserving of appreciation for being dedicated to their training.

"This isn't fair," Ino moaned, burying her head in her hands. "This just isn't _fair_. Sakura's sensei doesn't do this shit to her! That – _bastard_! That – ugly – stupid – evil – insane – _bastard_! _Just this once_ , can't we get a _break_?"

"Huh? What's that?" Naruto asked, pointing to a second note that was fluttering to the ground. It had been tacked on the scarecrow's back, instead of the front as the first note had been. He picked it up and unfolded it.

 _"And mind your language, Ino."_

Ino paused mid-rant to stare at the note. Her eye twitched.

I shrugged. "Told you he's always watching us."

* * *

 _This time_ , Naruto vowed. _This time, I'll get him for sure._

He silently thanked Shikamaru and Ino for taking him aside and forcing him to learn chakra walking. It was way easier to scan for people from up here than while being stuck in the massive crowd.

Days had passed, with no sign of their sensei. After the first two days of no luck, Shikamaru had been forced to conclude that Kakashi-sensei was using a physical disguise instead of Henge, and that trying to feel for any chakra in the mostly-civilian crowd was useless. Not that they'd be able to find him that way if he was really trying anyway – Shikamaru had pointed out that by the time one reached Jonin level, learning how to suppress your own chakra was a must.

Meaning they were going to go by the old-fashioned way: smell.

Because they were supposed to be a "capture and interrogation team" as opposed to a "combat team" or an "intel team" (Naruto winced as the memory of Ino beating those particular team type classifications into his mind), Kakashi-sensei had tested all of their skills in this field early on. What he found was that Ino was the most chakra-sensitive of all of them, with Shikamaru somewhere in between and Naruto at the very end because his chakra control was, "to put it simply, absolutely abysmal."

However, to balance that out, Kakashi-sensei had also pointed out that his sight, smell, and hearing was way above par for someone without any formal training, so it made sense that Naruto and his clones were going to be running around here now. Naruto scratched his head. He knew he wasn't the sharpest tool in the shed sometimes, but compared to back then, he felt he was a lot better. Some of the things that he liked to do back in the Academy seemed pretty stupid now. Maybe that was why Sakura always hit him.

But he'd show them! One day, he'd become the Hokage! And then everyone would respect him! Heck, Kakashi-sensei was respected around Konoha, and he was more of a jerkass than Sasuke-teme!...though in a not-quite-obviously jerkass way. Because everything he did seemed to be an accident. Even though Shikamaru always insisted that they weren't. Though Naruto couldn't quite wrap his mind around the fact that _anyone_ could plan that far ahead.

Maybe it was just one of Kakashi-sensei's life lessons. _"If something works in your favor, always pretend that it was all part of your plan. Even if it wasn't."_

The weird thing about being on Shikamaru's team – on being on any team, really – was that your teammates' personalities started to bleed over to you a little. He liked Shikamaru. Even though the teachers were always going on and on about how he was the most brilliant person in the history of forever to pass through their hands, he never let it make him a jerk like Sasuke did. He didn't make fun of Naruto for not getting things the first time around, either. He just treated Naruto just like a normal person and expected him to figure out how to keep up.

Which led to Ino, who he found wasn't as bad as he thought she was at first, even if she was crazy about Sasuke. Being stuck with her in this team for a while, and vice versa, had led both of them to figure out how to tolerate each other. Sure, she was super bossy, but she was also super cheerful and pumped up about most things, except practicing with Gai's team. Which he didn't get, because that was actually really fun, even if Gai-sensei was arguably even weirder than Kakashi-sensei sometimes.

He didn't know what to think about Kakashi-sensei. The guy was even worse than he was. In pranks, that is. Or was it better, because he never seemed to get into trouble for it? He wondered how the Academy teachers dealt with a younger Kakashi-sensei – surely the guy must have started really early in order to be this good. Or maybe he was just crazy, like Shikamaru said. Naruto never pegged Shikamaru as the type to be a conspiracy theorist, and yet, when it came to Kakashi-sensei, the guy seemed to think that _everything_ that happened was on purpose.

Naruto wished that he could doubt it; he really did. But considering that Shikamaru had never been wrong before…

No time for that now. Naruto suddenly caught a flash of powder blue – was it? – yes, it was! – out of the corner of his eye. There was a person walking along in a kimono, and it was the same pattern as the stuff in the package Kakashi-sensei had stolen – er, "found" – when they first arrived in Tanyu! Naruto couldn't feel any chakra, but that was probably because Kakashi-sensei was using regular disguises instead of a jutsu like _Henge_ , so that Ino couldn't find him so easily among the crowd of civilians. The hair was different, but that was probably just a wig – anyway, the person had the right height and bone structure, and you couldn't change that with physical means. And – yes, that was the Konoha smell on him; it wasn't easy to scrub out years of forest and tree sap.

"Found him!" Naruto – who was actually a clone – dispersed, and the _real_ Naruto, who was finishing their mission with Shikamaru and Ino, felt the slight resulting shock.

"Where?" his teammates asked, quickly jumping into action.

"Powder blue kimono, four o'clock. Same one he stole earlier this week," Naruto said quickly, gesturing over to his right. "Smells just like oaks and pine."

"On it," said Shikamaru, and his shadow quickly snaked around the cobblestones to latch onto their target, drawing the person toward them. "Go check."

"How are you doing that?" Naruto asked, scratching his head. "I thought you could only make them imitate you…"

"It _is_ possible to control movements while you stay still, or freeze them in place while you move, using a variation called the Shadow Clutch," Shikamaru explained. "It's just more difficult to use because it's extremely chakra intensive, and requires a lot of concentration. Technically I shouldn't be learning this until years later, but my mom made my dad start me early. It's not perfect yet – I can't get my shadow off the ground for very long – but I'm getting closer. It's all a matter of chakra reserves, and mine are still growing. It helps if I practice every once in a while."

"Oh."

"…That's not sensei," Ino said suddenly, as their target was dragged into visual range. "Naruto!"

Indeed, the person that Shikamaru had dragged towards them was actually a rather bewildered looking young woman.

And, upon second glance, Naruto realized, extremely pretty.

As in, even prettier than Sakura pretty.

And, judging from Ino's extremely jealous expression, prettier than Ino pretty, too.

Yeah, _that_ pretty.

 _Uhhh…_

"But there's that forest smell – " Naruto protested eloquently as his mind started going all fuzzy.

"Well, maybe it's just perfume designed to imitate that smell. And Shikamaru, let go of her! You're scaring her!" Ino hissed.

Shikamaru, who was, Naruto realized, still staring blankly, snapped his hanging jaw shut and shook his head as if to clear it. "Sorry, miss," he muttered, blushing.

The lady blinked at them, and then, without a word, ran in the opposite direction, too terrified to even speak.

They stared at her retreating form.

"Um. Well." Shikamaru scratched the back of his neck. Ino slapped the backs of their heads.

"Seriously. _Boys_. Even our resident genius is now rendered incoherent," she sighed.

"Hey – I don't see _you_ not becoming an unintelligible mess every time _Sasuke-kun_ walks by!" Shikamaru retorted, suddenly regaining his wits. "And for your information…"

"Sasuke-kun's _different_!" Ino argued hotly. "You don't even _know_ her! And she's way older than all of us! You're not even thirteen yet!..."

"Whatever," Shikamaru sighed. The gong in the main square rang, signaling the start of the Daimyo's festival. "Hopefully we have enough to go off of when he comes back with the quiz…"

 _Holy crap,_ Naruto was still thinking, unable to even chase the words from his mind. _She's even prettier than Sakura-chan._

* * *

 _Elsewhere..._

 _..._

 _..._

 _Oh, my cute students,_ Kakashi sighed, wiping the makeup off the scar over his eye. _You three were_ so _close…_

* * *

 **A/N: Troll Kakashi-sensei is troll.**

 **This chapter has fanart! All links are consolidated at: sites [period] google [** **dotcom] /view/boomvroomshroom** **(this page is also accessible from my profile).**


	7. Breaking Physics

BONUS #3:

 _Ino Yamanaka's Ranking List_

Shino Aburame: 4/10. No fashion sense. Funky hair. And bugs. (Big fat NO to bugs.) But he's hiding some pretty gorgeous eyes behind those glasses.

Choji Akimichi: 5/10. He's adorable, but not my type.

Kiba Inuzaka: 6/10. Bonus points for cute puppy. Bonus points for awesome fur coat. Bonus points for cool tattoos/fangs. Minus points for being a weirdo. Minus points for smelling bad.

Shikamaru Nara: 7/10. He's cool enough, I guess.

Sasuke Uchiha: 11/10. 'Nuff said.

Naruto Uzumaki: 6/10. He's cute (not Sasuke-cute; little-brother-cute), but so immature! (He's getting better, though.)

Neji Hyuga: 9/10. Pretty cool, but I don't know him that well. Looks like a girl from behind.

Rock Lee: 2/10. Deductions for eyebrows, bowl cut, completely circular eyes, and that ugly green jumpsuit. Deductions for being unhealthily obsessive. Pity points for effort.

* * *

 _Tanyu_

"Hmmm…How many stalls were on the west side of the square?"

I closed my eyes, trying to remember the scene. "Forty-one," I answered.

"Good. Ino – this one's for you. What did man behind the counter in the lantern shop on Sugar Street look like?"

I held my breath, but perhaps that had been unnecessary. Ino had kept an eagle eye on lock for the whole trip, as she had been in the most danger of suffering from extra training sessions with Gai-sensei. "Rather skinny middle-aged man," she answered immediately. "Scruffy-ish graying but not fully white beard with sideburns and moustache. He always wears a green vest with stripes while the store is open. Knobbly hands and glasses."

Kakashi-sensei smiled underneath his mask. "Correct. Naruto!"

"Yes?"

"Where was the Daimyo during this whole thing?"

"Ummm…" Naruto worried his bottom lip. He had had the greatest advantage out of all of us, since his clones were able to observe the entire city from various angles, but that also translated to a disadvantage, since his memory was the worst out of the three of us and the extra senses might have overloaded his brain. "I didn't see him outside anywhere, so he was probably in his palace the entire time."

Kakashi-sensei gave an approving nod. "I guess I won't be able to abandon you guys to Gai-sensei for once. I never thought I'd be saying this this early, but…three for three. You guys have exceeded my expectations."

"Whoa, really?" Naruto interjected. Kakashi-sensei cocked an eyebrow at him. "I mean, yeah, I knew that! And I totally didn't guess on anything…"

Ino breathed a sigh of relief. This had been the first time we had gotten all of the questions right without any mistakes. Then again, he had been relatively nice in his questions. Everything he gave us was limited to areas we had already seen. The last few times he had played this game with us while in Konoha, he had asked us about designs of the taps in certain bars in the less savory part of town. That we were too young to go into them didn't matter to him, since the counters of all the bars built in Konoha apparently looked the same – which we supposedly would have known if had we read the building codes inside the library.

And since the library was an open source reference building to people of all ages, all the information in it was also therefore completely fair game by his twisted logic. Of course, we had protested that building codes weren't exactly things shinobi should waste time looking up, but that had only led to him retorting that shinobi should always be highly aware of their own surroundings, which included architecture.

Still, today was an achievement to be remembered. Winning at one of his games, finishing certain milestones, and so on – I always felt this compulsion not to disappoint him. Kakashi-sensei was unpredictable, wild, and incorrigible – but he was also our sensei and we had to respect him on some level. There was no denying that the stunts he pulled were all so subtly effective that you actually ended up being surprised at yourself. If I didn't have Naruto and Ino as base comparisons from a third-person perspective, I never would have even realized how far I had progressed under his terribly successful teaching style.

The road back to Suna was about as peaceful as the away trip, except for a short dispute with a few young and inexperienced highwaymen whom we easily disposed of. Once again, we were reminded of how different the shinobi life was from the rest of the world. The robbers had been easy work – they weren't particularly skilled in any sort of combat – but had we not been there, they could very well have been lethal to Mr. Gyoza, even if he had hired regular, non-shinobi bodyguards. Things we took for granted, like someone of Ino's size sending a fully-grown man flying backwards ten meters with nothing but a well-placed kick between the legs, were pretty horrifying to both our clients and victims.

Our main problem, rather, came when we finally got to the front gate. Evidently, the central administration in Suna had learned from the last two times Kakashi-sensei had duped their gate guards, because the people manning the shift this time were a bunch of kids like us, only more miserable-looking. The older two just looked like they thought everyone younger than them were dirt, but the smallest one, especially, seemed rather unstable – but not in the same way Kakashi-sensei was. Kakashi-sensei just caused trouble; this guy looked like he wouldn't hesitate to kill you if you looked at him wrong. Even without the dark rings around his eyes, he looked perpetually angry.

Not that it bothered Kakashi-sensei. "Hello there!"

They responded with a glare. "Entrance fee?" the girl demanded.

Kakashi-sensei whistled and gave her a once-over. " _Wow_. What _do_ they put in the water in Suna?" I raised my eyebrow at him, not that he bothered to notice. Still, this was a bit far, even for _his_ standards. The girl was barely older than we were. And Kakashi-sensei…he was twenty-six, wasn't he? He was a lot of things, including a pervert, judging by his reading material, but he wasn't a criminal.

…Was he?

(He was, after all, a Jonin and former ANBU. Things that happened in ANBU stayed in ANBU, Ino's father had said. On second thought, maybe _that_ line wasn't as off-limits to our sensei as we initially thought it was, either. Did this guy even _have_ any boundaries?)

Clearly, the girl was not as romantically inclined as the last one, because she took a moment to glance around dubiously at the clearly water-less sand dunes around us before she finally understood what he was implying. " _Entrance. Fee,_ " she ground out, reaching for the massive metal fan on her back.

"Is that real?" Kakashi-sensei suddenly asked the murderous-looking one, drawing circles in the air around his eye with his finger. He didn't respond.

The girl stared at him like he was suicidal. Granted, he probably was, though of course I hadn't known it then. She quickly looked back and forth between Kakashi-sensei and the youngest kid, and I realized that she was actually _scared_ of him. Meanwhile, the middle child – a boy who seemed to be slightly older than us, though it was hard to tell with all that purple face paint – cleared his throat.

"Is he...okay?" he asked us, gesturing at our sensei with his chin. He had lost his arrogant attitude, too morbidly fascinated by the mental anomaly dancing before him to bother with keeping up his mask.

"Yeah, no," I answered. "Look, Sensei, Gyoza-san just wants to go home, so if you could – "

Kakashi-sensei ignored me, and proceeded to produce a tray of fresh sushi. Faster than the eye could follow, one of them disappeared from the plate, and we could see him chewing underneath his mask. He held the tray up to the three Suna gate guards. "Want one?" he asked, mouth full.

"Is that _fresh_ sushi?" Ino asked.

"Mm-hmm!" he nodded, and swallowed. Then another piece of sushi vanished. We hadn't even seen him pull down his mask.

"Where'd out get that?" the boy in the middle asked, baffled. "Suna's a landlocked nation. There's no running water for miles…we're too far inland for fresh fish…"

Kakashi-sensei finished his second piece. "From the ponds out in the desert."

We all turned to look. As expected, there were no ponds.

"…what ponds?" the girl with the fan asked.

"Those ones! Can't you see them? No?"

We shook our heads.

"It's actually a very special brand of sushi. This fish is only caught from those ponds," Kakashi-sensei explained, one visible eye growing wide and gesturing wildly with his free hand. "You see, these ponds move further away from you every time you take a step closer, and it's only by running faster than the speed of light that you can get to catch up to them. I forgot what they're supposed to be called, though."

"You mean the mirages?" the boy with the makeup asked.

"Yep! Those," Kakashi-sensei grinned, snapping his fingers. Another piece of sushi vanished. "But going back to what I was asking before, what _do_ they put in the water in Suna?"

"Sir, I am seventeen," the girl with the fan said. " _Entrance. Fee. Now._ "

"Wow! Me, too!" Kakashi-sensei grinned.

 _"Liar_ ," Ino muttered.

"And you're already Jonin?" she asked skeptically. "Has Konoha really lowered its standards so far that they'll let people like you become Jonin?"

"Actually, they raised the bar quite recently," Kakashi-sensei told her. "When they tossed me this rank, I was thirteen."

She blinked, once, twice, and then jumped back with a look of shock, drawing her fan. "You're _Kakashi no Sharingan_!" she hissed. "What do you want? What are you doing here?"

 _"Did Kakashi-sensei really become Jonin at thirteen,"_ Naruto hissed out of the corner of his mouth, _"or is he just messing with us all again?"_

 _"I think it's actually true…"_ Ino whispered back. _"I got to sneak a peek at my dad's copy of his psych evaluation once, and it included all of his ranking information…"_

Naruto shook his head. _"No wonder he's so messed up."_

"I'm taking my cute little students on their first C-rank," Kakashi-sensei said, jerking a thumb at the three of us and Gyoza-san. "I'm certainly _not_ here as a ruse to come into Suna to spy on the esteemed Kazekage. I'm also certainly _not_ here to steal any important kinjutsu scrolls, or assassinate any important Suna officials, or sabotage any negotiations you might be having with the Daimyo of the Land of Wind, or kidnap any jinchuuriki – "

The three of them tensed.

"GUARDS!" the girl suddenly yelled. Immediately, a swarm of masked Suna ANBU jumped down from the tops of the walls and seized Kakashi-sensei, the three of us, Gyoza-san, and all his luggage and goods.

"Sensei, what are you doing?!" Ino screamed. "This is a client!"

"Um, ANBU-san," Naruto whispered, "that guy right there is a Suna merchant, so, uhhh…look, our sensei's kinda crazy, so, uh…"

"Gyoza-san?" One of the Suna ANBU asked. Gyoza-san nodded, terrified out of his wits. The ANBU made some hand signs to his teammates. "Take the merchant and his bags back to his home. You four, Konoha nin, get out and _stay out_!"

"Okay!" Kakashi-sensei said cheerfully, somehow managing to give a lazy salute even with a scimitar against his throat. "Let's go, my cute students."

The ANBU released us and stalked back inside, all the while sending us nasty glares over their shoulders. We backed away slowly and then turned and started running.

"WHAT WAS THAT FOR, SENSEI?!" Ino screeched as soon as we had cleared the Suna guards' hearing range.

"Maa, maa, no need to panic like that," he said. "Gyoza-san is now safe and sound back in his home with all his money and goods, we didn't have to carry anything, the mission is complete, we're completely unharmed, and, to top it all off, we didn't even need to pay the entrance fee!"

The three of us groaned.

* * *

 _The Hokage's office_

Kakashi's first thought upon returning to Konoha was, _If you thought that your first C-rank was bad, kiddies, you should see what I have in store for you the next time around._ Then his second one was, _How I love freshness-preserving storage seals._ He disposed of his empty sushi tray in the little trash can specifically meant for paper and recyclables beside the Hokage's desk.

And speaking of the Hokage…

"Kakashi Hatake, why are you smiling so?" the Sandaime growled.

Kakashi turned his head. "Hmmm? I'm sorry, did you say something?"

"I _don't_ have time for this, Hatake," the Sandaime growled, reaching for his pipe and a match. "What is this I hear about threatening to steal the jinchuuriki of Sunagakure? You _know_ we're treading on thin ice in negotiations with them already! If you don't have a good reason for this insanity I _will_ have to take disciplinary action, Copy-Nin or _not_ – "

"Sandaime," Kakashi drawled coolly, "you know I _always_ have a method to my madness."

"Well? Let's hear it." The Sandaime leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms.

"If you must know, firstly," Kakashi told him, "I did _not_ threaten to steal their jinchuuriki. In fact, I _explicitly stated_ that I was _not_ going to do such a thing. They asked me to state my purpose, and I told them that I was there with my minions – I mean, my cute little students – to drop off a client after the end of our first mission. I merely added for clarification that I was not there to spy on the Kazekage, steal their secret jutsu, assassinate their leaders – "

"Which ensured that they'd assume the opposite!" the Sandaime roared.

"Not my fault they can't tell truth from lies," Kakashi shrugged. "Are you really going to blame _me_ for _their_ incompetence?" This was so unfair. His cute students had been allowed to collect their pay and leave _hours_ ago.

Okay, maybe not. In reality, they had only left about fifteen seconds ago. But still. It already felt like he had been here for _hours_. You'd think a Jonin who decided to take a pay cut from A-ranks back down to C-ranks, volunteering to teach a team of insolent Genin (never mind that he was actually the most immature one out of all of them), without expecting any benefits in return, would get a little more slack. Seriously. C-ranks were _boring_. He hadn't done them since he was five or six, and during that period of time, he hadn't screwed up a single one. He couldn't believe they were blaming him for acting like a kid _now_ to make up for lost time.

"No one can tell truth from lies when dealing with you, Hatake," the Sandaime sighed. "And anyway, I _know_ you told them the truth with the intention of provoking them, since I know _you_ knew that they wouldn't believe you, even if you told the truth."

Kakashi paused, trying to wrap his mind around that logic puzzle. "…I'm sorry?"

"Don't play dumb, Hatake. You're wasting my time. Why the hell did you provoke them?"

Kakashi sighed. " _You_ were the one who told me to observe them, sir."

"'Observation' implies involving a certain level of discretion, Hatake," the Hokage told him.

"And I _was_ discreet. They never realized that I was observing them – and, by the way, that doesn't mean I lied _before_ , because I only specified that I wasn't spying on the _Kazekage_. They totally thought that I was up to something else," Kakashi defended himself. "While they were wasting time holding their swords to my throat, I realized that they had about ten ANBU alone guarding their front gate. Normally, they'd only have one or two, like us. That means the other eight or nine, who were supposed to be on other missions, are instead lounging around at home, taking up whatever jobs they can to make themselves useful. And if you compare this number to the amount of active-duty ANBU that other intelligence seems to have gathered – assuming that it's correct – their unemployment rate and drop in missions seems to be much, much higher than 40%. Which only suggests that whatever they are planning might be arriving a great deal sooner than originally anticipated."

The Hokage glared at him. "And you couldn't have done that _without_ causing a riot?"

Kakashi shrugged. "I'm not a natural-born Sensor. From my position, I could only tell that there were a large amount of ANBU hiding behind the front gate, not how many there were. Superficially I could only distinguish maybe four or five of them. By drawing them out, I was able to give you a much better answer. Besides, no one was in any real danger. I made sure we were positioned so that if anything went wrong, I'd be able to easily grab all the kids and run. Not to mention, we had a well-known merchant with us. So, sorry, but not sorry. If you want my honest opinion, Hokage-sama, what I did today probably doesn't change their plans at all – they're already intending on executing some sort of large-scale sabotage as we know it."

The Hokage took a long, deep drag on his pipe. "And what do you think we should do, hmmm?"

"In all honesty? The best way to disable a trap is to spring it," Kakashi shrugged. "Take that how you will. Though I'm pretty sure you and your advisors already came to the same conclusion long ago."

The Sandaime glared at him, and then sighed and added more tobacco to his pipe. "Hatake."

"Yes, sir?"

"Get out. I have to think."

"Does this mean I'm not in trouble anymore, Hokage-sama?"

"GET OUT!"

Kakashi shrugged and sauntered out, quietly shutting the door behind him. _Sheesh,_ he thought. _I risk a scimitar to the neck to bring them important news and this is the thanks I get._

Suddenly, a thought occurred to him, and he reopened the door to the Hokage's office and poked his head inside. "By the way, Hokage-sama, I'm pretty sure that one of the Kazekage's three kids is their current jinchuuriki. His oldest daughter's a wind ninjutsu type, the middle son is a puppeteer, and his youngest son likes to glare at things until they spontaneously combust. You get three guesses to figure out which one it is and the first two don't count."

"HATAKE!"

Kakashi winced and slammed the door shut just in time to intercept a very heavy flying vase.

* * *

 _Training Ground 3_

"Well, I think I've melted your brains enough in the past week, so as a reward for all your hard work and your first successful C-rank, I'll make today a ninjutsu day. How does that sound?"

"YES," Ino cried. "Yes, please, thank the lord!"

Ninjutsu day was always good news. It was the one day Kakashi-sensei was actually entirely truthful with us. Sure, it would be just as exhausting as any normal day or training, but at least there were none of his weird mind games involved. Nature transformation in and of itself was a tricky business, even more so in the hands of Genin. Kakashi-sensei was crazy, but he wasn't stupid. He wouldn't deliberately mislead us when we had something as dangerous as half-formed elemental chakra in our hands. After all that he had done, he hadn't put our lives in danger…

Yet.

After all the time we had been together, we still knew very little about Kakashi-sensei. From the rare glimpses we had managed to catch of him interacting with other people in the village, we had determined that his social skills were malformed at best, and nonexistent at worst.

But every once in a while, our pure ninjutsu days reassured us that our sensei really was a human being and not some mentally deranged ghost. Kakashi-sensei had claimed, on our first meeting, that he had _some_ likes and dislikes – which, we had found out later, was actually much, much more than most people ever got. General consensus seemed to refer to Kakashi Hatake as this great, expressionless enigma, and the fact that he _had_ personal preferences about certain things, just like normal people did, was as much of a surprise to anyone as it was to us.

In any event, one of those "likes" had been elemental ninjutsu. He had plenty of talent in both genjutsu and taijutsu, but the way he trained us in ninjutsu clearly showed that it was his favorite discipline by far. He revered ninjutsu, just as much as Maito Gai and Rock Lee revered taijutsu, or the girls of our graduating class revered Sasuke Uchiha.

And though Ino and I both had non-elemental clan techniques, and Naruto was, well, Naruto, his enthusiasm was infectious all the same. With his flippant attitude toward nearly everything in life, finding just one thing that he actually cared about was an achievement in itself. You just didn't have someone like Kakashi Hatake as a teacher and _not_ walk away knowing at least _something_ about elemental manipulation.

"Just because I know a lot of big flashy A-rank techniques, doesn't always mean that they're the ones you should use," he had told us. "Often, the easy, simple ones are the most effective. The Headhunter Jutsu was one of the first earth-types I learned, and it hasn't failed me yet. The Great Fireball Jutsu is impressive, but a well-aimed Flash Jet to the face or the chest is just as deadly and harder to see. Used in tandem with a proper Wind technique, and you can level a whole forest with minimal effort on your part."

The Academy hadn't given us much detail beyond general theory about elemental ninjutsu, and for very good reason. The first time Naruto had attempted a simple wind technique, it had gone wonky and decimated three trees. Even now, when he had been practicing the Air Blade and other chakra control exercises for months, his aim was still quite mediocre. Learning the Kagemane had forced me to perfect my aim, and Ino had good control as always, but damn if Naruto couldn't take out a whole squadron of ANBU all by himself – and by accident, too.

But hey – this gave me something to work on, at least. There was only so much map-reading we could do in the library, my father had a job outside of playing strategy games with me, and I could only deal with Kakashi-sensei's "special" version of chess for so long.

(Maybe that was why he always claimed to be so "poor" despite having enough money to happily indulge in Naruto's ramen addiction every once in a while. All of his wages were spent on replacing his destroyed chess boards, since apparently the fact that the wood deformed when kunai were thrown at them was a novel revelation.)

And since doing nothing really did not suit me well, ninjutsu was a great way to pass my time in between missions.

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

"Did you have fun at training today?" my mother asked me as I walked through the door.

"As fun as it could ever be with a sensei like mine," I grinned. "It was ninjutsu day today. Pure, untampered ninjutsu." My mother nodded sympathetically. Both my parents were very familiar with Kakashi-sensei's rather odd way of doing things, to put it lightly. It was a good thing that I had inherited my father's patience and my mother's work ethic, rather than the other way around.

"Your father's waiting for you out by the fire pit," my mother told me. "The sun's going down."

I raised an eyebrow in confusion. In the past, that had meant that I was ready to undergo the next stage of Kagemane training, but I had since mastered all of the known forms (as far as my current chakra reserves would permit) already.

My father was poking at the embers with a stick when I got there. It was always interesting to practice the Kagemane around an open flame – the way shadows reacted to the constant motion of dim light was incomprehensible to anyone who hadn't spent many sleepless nights observing them as my father and I had. "Tell me, Shikamaru, how long does your shadow last against a struggling opponent?"

I had tested this with Naruto, Ino, and Kakashi-sensei before. "With the target actually trying to escape? It ranges from about ten minutes to twenty." Ten minutes, because Kakashi-sensei knew how to actively cycle his chakra opposite to his natural flow so that it took me extra power to counteract it, and the extra time because neither Naruto nor Ino had the same skill he did. (Ino was close, but her reserves were just as paltry as mine.)

"And if you control them so that their movements are not mirroring yours?"

"Around eight and a half minutes against my sensei, and maybe twelve to fifteen minutes against my teammates," I told him. Both of those values weren't too bad, really. It took much less than a second to kill someone – theoretically. I had never done it before, though I was aware that one day I would have to.

"And all at once?"

"Maybe subtract one to two minutes from each. It depends on how many people I'm trying to bind at once."

My father nodded. "Good. Good." He was muttering more to himself than to me. "Very good, for someone your age." He poked at the embers a bit more. "Tell me, Shikamaru, why do you think the Kagemane is so difficult to use successfully?"

The simplest answer was that it was limited by the sun, and, since I was not at my full height yet, body size. However, I had figured out how to get around that a long time ago simply through brute-force practice. An infinitely fine thread, so thin it was impossible to see, could stretch to almost unlimited lengths even at noon. Of course, even this had its downsides, which was why I worked hard on elemental ninjutsu, too.

"It's a massive chakra drain," I answered.

"And why, do you think, it is so much more difficult than, say, the Mind-Transfer Jutsu of the Yamanaka?"

I had thought about this question before. "I'm guessing it's because the target retains control of their own self-will, and is actively trying to get away as the binding takes place." Perhaps my father had come up with a much better solution than mine?

My father nodded. "Now tell me, how much easier do you think it would be, if the movement of your shadow is not restricted to your position? And how easier would it be still, if self-will could _also_ be overridden?"

I raised an eyebrow. "Is that even possible?"

"You tell me."

"How come I've never heard of this?"

My father chuckled. "You're only the second."

I frowned. "Then you…"

"If you had been born as lazy as I was, Shikamaru, then maybe I would have been content to sit around watching clouds all day. But how can I lie back and do nothing, when both my wife and my own son work so hard, hmmm?" The shadows shifted again. "I might be aging, but I'm not _that_ old, yet. As the head of the Nara clan, I should be expected to contribute to our technique repertoire. There is still time to discover, Shikamaru. The sun is setting."


	8. Letters and Detours

_The Nara Clan Compound_

"Dad," I asked, "how long have you been working on this?"

"I've been…toying around with the idea for a while now. I didn't start researching the technique in earnest until after you were born."

"Is it….safe?" I asked.

"Safe? No. Definitely not," my father told me. "But you are as ready as you will ever be for this technique, Shikamaru. There will come a time when I will no longer be able to protect you, and when that time comes it will fall upon you to defend yourself. And – I trust you."

Logically, those words just sounded like any other reassurance from father to son; all parents wanted to shield their children from the world. Only, my father seemed more grave than usual tonight, as if the dangers he mentioned were something very close and real and tangible instead of just the general things like war and hunger and spiders. As if there was something specifically targeting _me_ , something that I didn't know about.

I made no comment.

"Now, the first thing you must know is: when you practice this modified version of the Kagemane, you may _not_ work for any longer than five minutes in one given sitting. Secondly, you may not practice any more than once every twenty-four hour period regardless of whether your one sitting took the full five minutes or only one second. When you are going to go practice, you will tell me and I will supervise you for the entire duration of the technique. Even _after_ you have mastered it enough that I have cleared you for its usage out in the field, you _must_ use it sparingly and cautiously. Is that understood?"

"Yes, sir."

"Then. Let us begin. Day one. Do not, under any circumstances, confuse this for the Yamanaka Mind Transfer Jutsu. That technique is completely safe to those who know how to use it. But even after ten years, the separation of your own consciousness is never a pleasant feeling. If you are careless, you _will_ get lost."

"Dad…what…?"

"The Yamanaka techniques are very delicate and leave no imprint. A visitor, borrowing control for a while, if you will. _This_ form of the Shadow Possession, on the other hand, may theoretically last for as long as you like, because it does not require chakra to maintain. Once it makes contact with the target, it is a completely unrestricted mental takeover. Shikamaru, do you know what happens during a complete and unrestricted mental takeover?"

"…No? Why – do they die?"

My father smiled grimly. "Technically, the heart can still beat, even when the conscious part of the brain has shut down."

I frowned. "How do you know? Who did you practice all of this on?"

"You're a smart boy, Shikamaru. You should know that Konoha is not all smiles and rainbows like we lead others to believe."

I decided not to contest his non-answer. "Given the…restrictions…you placed on this technique – aren't there more efficient and safe ways to, well, achieve the same purpose? I'm pretty sure a medic-nin knows how to put someone in a permanent coma _without_ all of that…"

My father smiled ruefully. "There are terrible things in this world that you haven't seen yet, son. Terrible things that die but _don't – effing – stay dead –_ but never mind that." He reached into a sack behind him and pulled out a rabbit, still trapped in its snare. "You will start with this. Concentrate on the physical target, and then, instead of reaching out with your shadow, carve it into two pieces, and move the separate component across the ground without moving the main piece still attached to your body."

"What – now?"

"You probably won't get it right away."

"How is that supposed to work?" I asked, staring skeptically at my body, which was still, as far as I was concerned, in one piece.

"Personally, I find it helpful to practice shaping it into an hourglass figure first, and then figuring out how to sever that last thread later."

I had played around with my shadow many times before, bending it to make shapes on the wall – deer and boats and trees and such when my own hands were not flexible enough to create such a detailed shadow puppet. An hourglass was child's play to me. But cutting that last connection…

I don't quite remember when I blacked out, but when my alarm clock rang this morning I felt as if I hadn't slept at all.

* * *

 _Training Gound 3_

"Hello, my cute students!"

"Will you _stop_ calling us that?" Naruto whined. "We're _shinobi_! We're not _supposed_ to be 'cute'!"

 _So cute,_ Kakashi thought to himself. "We have yet another C-rank!" It seemed as if they had been assigned to nothing _but_ C-ranks for the past five months. Probably because the front desk kept getting complaints whenever Team 7 was given a D-rank. Unlike most bad reviews, however, these ones were directed at the Jonin instructor, and not the Genin.

Kakashi snickered behind his mask.

"I don't suppose we can go back to chasing Tora?" Ino muttered.

"We are going to deliver mail!" Kakashi cheerfully ignored her. Shikamaru's eyes were slowly drooping shut and snapping open again. Hmmm. Not good.

"…What's the catch?" Naruto asked warily.

 _Ah, they're learning. Just a few months ago they would have gone, "That's not too bad."_ "Our courier mission is actually very important. These messages are instructions going to our military outposts on Hi no Kuni's northern border. Now, I know you three managed to _not_ screw up the few letter-delivery missions in Konoha that we've had, but the area was a very well-confined one that you were all familiar with. Here, we'll be out on the open road, without any proper pavement or direction signs. These letters _must_ get to the right people, and they _cannot_ be late. I don't suppose I'll need to explain to you that they cannot be intercepted or seen by anyone other than our own, either."

"Let me guess: map time?" Ino asked.

He had actually been about to train them in tree travel – or rather, how to tree travel _faster_ , since in Konoha everyone and their mother knew what a tree was – but a second look at Shikamaru made him decide that maybe having massive nin-dogs nipping at their heels as they jumped through branches several meters off the ground was not the safest thing to do right now.

He really needed to give Shikamaru a talk about the difference between physically and mentally showing up for duty. Not now, though. It would all go in one ear and out the other.

"Yes! Map time!" he grinned.

"…Is that it?" Naruto asked, also glancing at the completely silent Shikamaru.

…Should he, or should he not? Making them angry was just so fun, and he had already been nice to them yesterday, what with ninjutsu time and all…

Oh, well.

"Yes. That's it," he told them. "This mission is actually important."

They all nodded and headed off. Kakashi himself decided to head off to ANBU headquarters to visit Ibiki. Though he wasn't formally allowed in there anymore, that didn't mean he couldn't loiter around the front just to screw with the minds of the new recruits. It was something Ibiki always approved of. He hadn't messed with his team today, so someone else would have to pick up the slack. It was only fair.

* * *

 _The Konoha Public Library_

"Oh, no," Ino muttered to herself. "It's _him_ again." She tried her best to hide behind the map that she had been looking at before Lee came barging in, but to no avail. Lee seemed to have some sort of magical mental radar that was unfortunately focused on only her, much like Maito Gai's magical mental honing device for Kakashi-sensei, and nothing she did could shake him off.

They were currently supposed to be doing research in preparation for their next C-rank. _That_ particular lesson had been learned the hard way once and only once: never go into a mission unprepared if your team leader is someone like Kakashi Hatake. And Kakashi-sensei's definition of "unprepared" was basically anything short of "ready for everything that could possibly happen – even if it's impossible."

Considering that it was _Kakashi-sensei_ they were referring to, the impossible was time and time again proven to be very well within the realm of possible.

Which was why she was here with Shikamaru and Naruto _now_ , finding out everything they could about their future mission. Or at least, she and Naruto were – Shikamaru, who was normally so alert, was currently in this state of half-awareness. She had known Shikamaru long enough to realize that it would be one of _those_ days again. Obviously he had stayed up training with his father all of last night. He'd be completely useless for the next few hours, Ino knew, but of course she let Shikamaru tag along to the library anyway, just to give him the illusion of being useful. Shikamaru was the type to always feel bad when other people worked and he didn't, even if his rest was well-deserved. This was probably why Kakashi-sensei had deemed today to be pre-mission research day, too, instead of the normally grueling training he put them through.

She still hadn't forgiven that man for ruining her favorite outfit, by the way.

Apparently, while the mission itself was simple enough, the story behind it was anything but. It had taken her hours to coax the whole thing out of her father, and even after that it had taken him hours to tell it.

Not too long ago, a team of Konoha Chunin had been assigned to a standard C-rank to escort a bridge builder named Tazuna back to his home in the Land of Waves. However, shortly after they had departed, they had been attacked by the Demon Brothers – two missing-nin from the Hidden Mist. While the Chunin team had luckily managed to fend off their assailants without any casualties, it had raised some interesting questions, such as why the missing-nin were even after the man in the first place, when C-rank escort missions only detailed help against standard untrained bandits and thieves.

It turned out Tazuna had lied about the mission parameters because Wave was an impoverished nation despite their economically and militarily strategic location – all of which had opened up yet another can of worms involving Gato, a crime lord that had taken over the place some years before. The reason why Gato wanted him dead was because Tazuna was trying to build a bridge to the mainland, which would strip Gato of his monopoly over the island nation.

Unfortunately, however, the government of Konoha hadn't particularly cared about the lives of the citizens of Wave as much as they cared about the wellbeing of their _own_ citizens – in this case, the squad of Chunin whose lives Tazuna had endangered because of his lies. Following that, Tazuna had been temporarily imprisoned while administration figured out what to do about Gato and Wave, since having missing-nin knowingly housed so close to the coast of Hi no Kuni was unacceptable to the Hidden Leaf.

The Land of Fire could have easily destroyed Gato before, had they wished it – they certainly had the wealth and military power to do so – but up until such an insult it hadn't been worth the effort. All Ino could say to that was, _What an idiot._ It was one thing to beat up a bunch of defenseless fishermen. It was another to directly challenge one of the Great Elemental Nations and their trained ninja village. Whether Gato seriously was intending to take on Konohagakure no Sato, or whether he was just being too arrogant and greedy for his own good, didn't change the fact that he had given foreign criminals asylum in what was basically the backyard pool of Hi no Kuni.

It hadn't ended there, though. The Demon Brothers weren't the _only_ missing-nin Gato had hired. If he had just stopped at two Chunin, perhaps he would have gotten away with it. But word was it that Zabuza Momochi, a former swordsman of the Hidden Mist, was somehow involved as well. Zabuza Momochi had been supposed to kill Tazuna, should the Demon Brothers fail; unfortunately, that was impossible now, since murdering Tazuna meant infiltrating the prisons of another major Hidden Village – one which had his name in their Bingo Books. Ironically, prison was _the_ safest place for Tazuna, right now.

Prisons and fortresses – both were equally good at keeping people out as well as in.

It was a little iffy about what had happened after that, but from what Ino had managed to wheedle out of her father, Gato had refused to pay Zabuza for all of his services up until that point, just because he had been unable to fulfill this last task. Zabuza, since he no longer had a Hidden Village to back him up, subsequently murdered Gato and all of his thugs, stole even more money than what he had been due, and left.

So now there was this massive power vacuum in Wave Country. Though the people were poor, the land itself was still very rich and highly profitable, both for trade and military reasons. Kirigakure was still too messed up from its highly long and bloody civil war to stake any claim on this place, but Kumo, having been a highly stable military and economic power for quite some time, was not. It was, of course, impossible for Konoha to just stand back and watch this take place, since Wave was now technically under control of Hi no Kuni, the geographically closest major nation to it. To allow a rival village to take control of Wave was disastrous.

Which meant that Konoha would have to return Tazuna back to Wave, install him as some sort of puppet leader before things got too out of hand, all the while delaying the forces from Cloud until the entire administrative mess had been sorted out.

And so that trickled down to little three-man cells like theirs, whose jobs varied from cleaning up the mess Gato and his men had left in Wave, to building the bridge to the mainland for easier access for troops, to keeping watch on the forces from Lightning. In the end, everything worked out for Tazuna, who got his guard mission _and_ his bridge done for free, just because he lied and got caught.

All of which paled in comparison to the – _thing_ – DANCING IN FRONT OF HER FACE RIGHT _NOW_!

How was she supposed to concentrate on tracing out the most efficient path between message outposts on Konoha's northern borders when _this_ guy was chasing her all over the place and yelling in her ear?

"MY BEAUTIFUL INO-CHANNN~!"

"This is a library, young man!" the woman behind the counter hissed angrily.

"I AM SO SORRY! I WILL TRY MY BEST TO BE QUIETER! AND IF I CANNOT BE QUIETER THEN I SHALL RUN ONE HUNDRED LAPS AROUND KONOHA! ON MY HANDS! WHILE JUGGLING KUNAI WITH MY FEET!"

 _"Help me,"_ she mouthed to Naruto, who shrugged apologetically. Ino looked helplessly at Shikamaru. His eyes were glazed over, and he didn't even look like he'd be awake for any longer.

Nope. This was going to be her fight and hers alone.

"Um, Lee? I'm really flattered that you think of me in this way, but – "

"MY BEAUTIFUL INO-CHAN! WE SHALL BE TOGETHER FOREVER AND ALWAYS – "

Out of the corner of her eye, through a gap in the books on the shelf at her side, Ino suddenly saw Sakura passing through the doors. This was not good. If Sakura saw something like this she'd never hear the end of it. She had to get rid of Lee somehow – and quickly. God, this was so embarrassing! She'd rather _die_ than let Sakura find out about something like this!

" – AND WE SHALL ENGAGE IN THE MOST YOUTHFUL OF YOUTHFUL ACTIVITIES TO DECLARE OUR ETERNAL AND UNDYING LOVE – "

Ino winced. Did Lee _not_ just understand the implications of what he just said? You didn't say stuff like that in public!

"NO!" Ino hissed.

Lee stopped mid-rant. "What?"

"I said no," Ino said more firmly, putting her hands on her hips.

Lee was crestfallen. "But…why?" His eyes started to water.

 _Oh, god…poor guy…if only…No! Snap out of it, Ino! This is_ your _future we're thinking of! Lee can always find someone else!_ Not that Lee wasn't a good, kind, hardworking person (there were far worse people in the world), but…seriously. She had to draw the line his at stalkerish behavior. This was sexual harrassment, for god's sake!

…Though she doubted Lee even knew what "sex" even _was_.

"Listen, Lee. You and Gai-sensei really get along, don't you?" Ino asked him.

"YOSH! GAI-SENSEI IS THE GREATEST NINJA TO HAVE EVER LIVED!" Lee boomed.

"This is a _library_!" the lady behind the desk hissed.

"That's where you're wrong," Ino told him, a Shikamaru-worthy plan forming in her mind. "Because Kakashi-sensei is the greatest ninja to have ever lived. Not Gai-sensei."

Behind her, Naruto snorted into his books. She turned back to glare at them. _"You_ could _make yourself useful, you know,"_ she snapped out of the corner of her mouth.

 _"Sorry,"_ Naruto whispered, and went back to his book, still snickering.

Lee, meanwhile, was looking at her as if she had just said the most blasphemous thing he had ever heard. Actually, come to think of it, that probably _was_ the most blasphemous thing he had ever heard. "No. No…Ino-chan…you _can't_ …"

"Lee, I hate to break it to you, but we can never be together. You are Gai-sensei's esteemed disciple. On the other hand, I am _Kakashi-sensei's_ esteemed disciple. Gai-sensei and Kakashi-sensei are eternal rivals. Therefore…"

"…you and I are also doomed to be eternal rivals," Lee gasped in realization. Utterly crushed, he fell to his hands and knees, and howled his anguish to the heavens. "NOOOOOO!"

"That's it!" the lady behind the desk screeched. "OUT! _O – U – T – OUT!_ "

And then suddenly there was an evil little spark of mischief bursting in the back of Ino's mind. She didn't know where it came from or why it was there (though she suspected Kakashi-sensei had had something to do with it). All she knew was that her inner devil was there to stay, and that there was absolutely no way she could _not_ listen to it, now that it had already started giving her brilliantly dastardly ideas.

"I'm so sorry, Lee," she said, feigning heartbreak, "but please, don't let this bring you down forever! There are probably lots of other beautiful and strong girls out there, just like me!"

"But you are the only one for me, Ino-chan," Lee looked up, his face stained with tears.

"Not quite," she said. "For example, _Sakura-chan_ over there is a _very_ good friend of mine, and she is just as beautiful and strong. " _Not really. I hate her. I really do. Kind of. I haven't seen her in a while. I miss her. I wonder how she's doing. Not that I care. Because I hate her._ "Why don't you go over and talk to her? See what you have in common? Her teacher is Kurenai-sensei, I think, so you won't have to deal with the whole 'Eternal Rival' thing as a barrier."

"Yosh," Lee said sadly, standing up and brushing off his jumpsuit. He began to walk away, but not before he turned around and said, "I shall do as you say. Though I do not think it will help my broken heart any. Eternal rivals or not, you are still the world to me. Our star-crossed love SHALL prevail!"

Ino and Naruto both winced as they watched him leave their corner of the library. It wasn't until Lee was finally gone that Ino finally smirked and sat back down to trace out possible routes on their maps again.

She felt someone staring at her, so she looked up. Naruto was staring at her, his jaw slack.

"What?" she snapped defensively.

"Did you just…" Naruto trailed off, unable to form any coherent sentences.

"Did I just _what?_ " Ino asked him, putting her hands on her hips.

"Did you just set _Rock Lee_ on Sakura?" he whispered. "I knew you two were rivals, but I didn't realize you hated her _that_ much…"

"I _don't_ hate her that much," Ino told him. "She'll be _fine_ – "

"YOSH! MY BEAUTIFUL YOUNG KUNOICHI! ARE YOU THE FAMOUS SAKURA-CHAN THAT THE WORLD SPEAKS SO HIGHLY OF? O MY SUN AND STARS, COME HITHER, AND WE SHALL FOREVER BE JOINED IN FATE, NEVER TO BE PARTED – "

" _EEEEEEEEEEEE!_ Get _AWAY_ from me, you creep!"

"…Maybe," Ino finished sheepishly. "Better her than me, right?"

Yes, Kakashi-sensei was a very, _very_ bad influence. But she didn't care.

Not one bit.

* * *

Kakashi whistled to himself as he walked home. The reactions of the new recruits had been very good. Most people hesitated to deal with an insane stranger. Today's guards, however, had taken him seriously, even though he was a known Konoha nin. That was good. It meant that ANBU was up to par in terms of recognizing duplicity. The old-timers were always complaining about how their forces were going "soft" just because children were allowed to hit puberty _before_ being exposed to all of the irreversible war-induced trauma of the past now. Well, this should satisfy them…

Then again, it could very well mean that ANBU was _used_ to dealing with people like him now. Hmmm…

It was at that point that Gai's non-genetic offspring passed him with the usual gusto. He seemed very busy chasing something – something very _pink_ and definitely not Ino. And then his brain caught up to his eyes and realized that Rock Lee was chasing something that was _definitely not Ino_.

Which could only mean one thing – someone else had caught his otherwise unshakeably loyal attention…

 _Oh, Ino,_ Kakashi thought, _I am_ so _proud of you._

* * *

 _One week later_

Thankfully, during the course of their courier mission, Kakashi-sensei had not wasted very much time taking them on weird detours and stuff, and he hadn't challenged any of the outpost guards to one of his trippy verbal spars even once. Really, the only Kakashi-sensei-like thing Kakashi-sensei _had_ done was summon his nin-dogs and have them chase their team for the duration of the trip so that they'd run faster.

Ino had screamed and complained a bit, but compared to the other things Kakashi-sensei had made them do in the past, this really wasn't at all that bad. Besides, the dogs were sorta cute. Most animals didn't like Naruto much for some reason, but Kakashi's nin-dogs always let him pet them after the chase was over.

For which Naruto was very glad. He couldn't tell what Kakashi-sensei was thinking half the time, and it was really, really annoying. Even though he was now a lot better at telling the difference between Kakashi-sensei joking and actually being serious about them doing the crazy stuff that he considered to be "actually very necessary," he still wasn't as good as Shikamaru or Ino.

Shikamaru had told him that the reason why Kakashi-sensei was taking this seriously for once was because the situation was actually serious – which Naruto guessed made sense. The Cloud ninjas were getting really restless because of the whole situation in Wave, and meanwhile the finances of Sand were reportedly only getting worse. If push came to shove, any ninja village was a force to be reckoned with, and Konoha couldn't fight a two-front war, not if the Earth ninjas decided to take advantage of the situation and turn the two-front war into a three-front one, just to get revenge for their loss in the Third Shinobi World War all those years ago.

At least, that was what Shikamaru had told him. All this politics stuff was so confusing. Naruto didn't know how Shikamaru came up with all that stuff out of the blue all by himself. It made sense, though, after he explained it. As long as Kakashi-sensei acted normal-ish during the mission...

...of course, going home was an entirely different story.

"Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto asked. "This isn't the right direction." If there was one book-related thing he knew how to do, it was read maps – and this definitely wasn't south.

"I know," Kakashi-sensei said. "We're taking a _detour_. See, after all that hard work you kids did, I thought I'd take you guys on a vacation. A nice, long vacation."

Uh-oh. "Vacation", for Kakashi-sensei, was never a good thing. And out here, with no one to give them strange looks or to call Kakashi-sensei out on his weirdness, it would be even crazier. That guy took the meaning of a "working holiday" _way_ too literally.

"Sensei, we're supposed to be back in Konoha by _tomorrow_!" Ino pointed out. "If we go this way, we'll be late by a whole day! Two, maybe, if whatever you're planning will take even more time than that."

"Well, then, you better run fast if you don't want to be late, right?" Kakashi-sensei asked.

"Sensei, that's not fair!" Naruto protested. "They'll send people out to look for us! And when we finally get back and they realize it was all just a waste of time they'll put a bad mark on our record! I already have enough bad marks as it is!"

"Oh, it's all right, Naruto. I'm your team leader; I'll take responsibility for the tardiness if they nitpick. I already sent them a note. Besides, I'm _always_ late. We'll be fine."

Several hours later, Ino was asking, "So, where _are_ we going?"

"Southeast. We're going southeast. Konoha is south _west_ of here," Shikamaru muttered mostly to himself. "What could be southeast of here? There's Wave country, but we're not involved there – the situation is too dangerous for Genin. Where the hell are we going?"

Kakashi-sensei's only answer to both those questions had been, "You'll see. It'll be great."

Which was sort of true, when they finally got there the next day. The place really was beautiful, with pools of clear, clean water everywhere.

Of course, since this was Kakashi-sensei, that only heightened their paranoia.

"What are you waiting for? Jump right in. The water's amazing," Kakashi-sensei told them, walking out on the surface of the lake. "Well?"

The three of them stood resolutely on shore.

"Look – we'll have to get to _that_ patch of land for our training sooner or later," said Kakashi-sensei, pointing off to a tiny island-like structure way in the distance. "So you guys better get moving fast. You don't want to be stuck walking across the water after the sun has already gone down."

"But that looks _really far_ ," Ino whispered.

"All the better to improve your endurance with. Let's go," Kakashi-sensei clapped his hands.

Naruto groaned, but took a few steps out anyway – and then nearly drowned when he felt something drag him under. If Kakashi-sensei hadn't caught him in time…

"OI! What the heck is it with the currents in this place?!" Naruto yelled. "This is crazy!"

"And Naruto, you need to practice chakra control, too, so we're really helping all three of you in one go. Come on."

"But this – these – they're _whirlpools_ ," Shikamaru suddenly realized. "This entire place is full of whirlpools. Sensei. You've taken us to the ruins of Uzushiogakure."

"Hm? Did I?" Kakashi-sensei asked, and suddenly, his little smiles and tricks no longer seemed so pointless or stupid. "So it seems like I have. Come on, my cute little Konoha genin. You can't go through life without knowing what the bright red target signs on the backs of our flak jackets truly mean."

* * *

 **A/N: Throwing this out right now – the new technique is not something I randomly made up just to give Shikamaru a power boost. In fact, it's something Kishimoto already introduced (or my interpretation of it, at any rate). Not going to say what, but if you can guess it, I'll...do something.**


	9. The Ruins of Uzushiogakure

BONUS #4

 _ARE YOU A *historically accurate* NINJA?_

 **Question 1.** What do you normally wear?

a) Black pants. Black jumpsuit. Black everything. And a mask.

b) Camouflage gear, with hidden weapons strapped all over my body.

c) Clothes…?

 **Question 2.** A powerful samurai is about to attack you. What do you do?

a) Defeat the enemy with my amazing skills in martial arts.

b) Use a combination of trickery and magic to deceive my opponent.

c) What any reasonable person would do and GET THE HELL OUT OF THERE!

 **Question 3.** Would you ever run away from a fight?

a) No. I am not so weak.

b) Never. That is not my shinobi way.

c) Oi! It's called a * _strategical retreat_ *!…um…yeah…

 **Question 4.** Your weapon of choice is whatever is within arm's distance at this very moment.

a) I have a knife.

b) I have a sword.

c) I have…a pen…?

 **Question 5.** Quick! Enemy soldiers are chasing you!

a) I turn on them and massacre ten of them in a flash.

b) I've already poisoned them all; they'll be dead in thirty seconds.

c) _please don't see my hiding spot please don't see my hiding spot please don't see my hiding spot_

 **Question 6.** What do you think of my jokes?

a) They're amazing.

b) They're godly.

c) They suck.

 **Results**

Mostly a's: Liar.

Mostly b's: Big fat liar.

Mostly c's: Ironically, you _are_ a historically accurate ninja!…Meaning you'll be dead within five seconds of entering the Narutoverse.

* * *

 _Konoha_

Considering that he had grown up with people like Choza and Shikaku for friends, Inoichi had gotten used to an exasperating level of calmness. As in, Shikaku was the type to roll over and go back to sleep even under heavy artillery bombardment because "from my calculations, they don't have the firepower to reach any of our positions," and Choza was the type to agree with Shikaku just because doing so conserved the most calories.

But he, like his daughter, also knew that appearances could be deceiving. Being a Yamanaka meant that you were more in-tune with the emotions of others, and being a trained interrogator in the upper echelons of ANBU meant that you could distinguish between all sorts of faces. And, having known Shikaku for nearly his entire life, Inoichi would be embarrassed if he couldn't distinguish between the man's many shades of apathy. There was a huge difference between "my face is blank because I'm being lazy; leave me alone" and "my face is blank because my brain has shut down; please help me" and "my face is blank because I am about to engage in some extremely dangerous and perhaps treasonous behavior that must remain a secret no matter what; please _keep_ this secret because I trust _you_ ".

"Shikaku. Talk to me."

His old friend rolled over and looked him in the eye. "What is there to say? Soon enough, our war will become our children's. It has already started."

"Has it?" Inoichi asked.

"It has," Shikaku confirmed. "He was back yesterday, you know. I had been hoping that the truce we had established six years ago would have lasted just a little longer – and on the surface, the two of us are still pretending to ignore each other – but of course you already know the truth. He's going to be moving back out in the open again soon enough."

Inoichi did already know the truth. He had known the truth since ten years ago, when Fuu had been taken from him. And he had been keeping track of every single little detail of that truth since then. This new development, however, was highly troubling; Inoichi would have to step up his game. As did Ibiki, and Shibi Aburame. "I take it you've started Shikamaru on that technique, then," Inoichi said.

"I regret nothing," Shikaku responded, more to convince himself than to convince Inoichi. "It was necessary. It had to be done. So I did engage in some nasty bits of work, getting to this point, but still – it was necessary."

"If I had disagreed with you I wouldn't have helped you," Inoichi reassured him.

"Mm." Shikaku seemed to find the ground very interesting. "I thank you for that."

The two of them shared in the silence for a while.

"I wish he would just _die_ already," Inoichi muttered. It was a hopeless wish. Danzo Shimura had a lot of backup plans up his sleeves, and it would be foolhardy to strike so rashly. Especially when, at this point in time, the man's death would most likely cause more problems than those he created while he still lived.

"I think that's something a lot of people wish," Shikaku said, standing up. "A little easier said than done, though." And he was correct again, as usual. Right now, they were both in a less than optimal situation. Danzo Shimura simply had better starting positions and better resources, not to mention the first move in this silent war, and every second they wasted was every second he had to shore up his defenses.

Inoichi had trusted Shikaku to be able to stand up to him then, the first time Shikamaru had been targeted, and he still trusted Shikaku to be able to stand up to him now – but the fact that they were currently in such a disadvantageous situation compared to a man like that was very worrisome. He could no longer sit around waiting for anyone else to make a move; they had to strike now while they still had a chance.

"Well, it can't be just wishful thinking anymore," Inoichi pointed out. "We – the both of us – are already too far involved in this. He _has_ to die. Or it'll be us. And then where will Shikamaru be? Where will Ino be? He's _winning_ , Shikaku, if you hadn't realized. He has more power, influence, and soldiers than any of us."

At this, Shikaku's face adopted an odd little look. One that was halfway between a smile and not.

"That is true. He is winning right _now_."

Then Shikaku inhaled, and took a long sip of his tea.

"But I play the long game, Inoichi."

* * *

 _Uzushiogakure_

Even Naruto was dead-beat tired by the time they had made it across the water to the shores of the ruins. But Kakashi was so proud of them. The crossing had taken approximately three hours, and during that whole time not a single one of his genin had given up partway.

The fact that they would have been sucked under by the whirlpools if they even made one false step might have had something to do with it.

"Sensei, please, can't we have just a tiny break?" Ino gasped from the sand.

Kakashi, of course, was completely fine. Kind of. He was a little bit tired himself. Last time he had done this, he hadn't even broken a sweat. Of course, he had been at the peak of his ANBU training then, and the weight of his armor had been just a fraction of the mass of the big bulky flak jacket the standard forces wore. Also, he had been busy keeping up a safety net of chakra underneath his students' feet the entire time, just in case one of them really _did_ exhaust themselves and fall through. (He wasn't stupid – accidents happened all the time, and while he was good at gauging both his comrades' and enemies' skill levels, it wasn't enough to justify putting his students in _actual_ danger.)

But he'd judge himself just as hard as he judged others, and right now he was going to give himself the verdict that he was rather out of shape, even for someone who was training like a normal person and not like, well, the freak that he had been in ANBU. Going from A-ranks and S-ranks to D-ranks and C-ranks tended to do that to a person.

"Sure. Why don't you guys sit down here, and I'll give you all a little history lesson," Kakashi smiled, to Naruto's great dismay.

"That's not a _break_!" he protested.

"Shut up!" Ino snapped. "It's better than nothing, and besides, history lectures are _very long_. And you know what we'll be doing the whole time? _Sitting down_."

Naruto was actually quiet after that.

"Now, settle down, my cute students," Kakashi said, even though they really didn't need any actual "settling down" (he _had_ , after all, just led them on a three hour run straight across a great body of violently agitated water – right after an entire day of land travel at top speed). "This is actually a very important story, and I don't mind you lying down as long as you actually listen and don't fall asleep."

They all immediately understood that that meant "we will be having a quiz on this tomorrow, so pay attention", something which he really was so proud of them for. They had only been dealing with him for a few months. It had taken his ANBU team almost a year to stop falling for his tricks and lies.

The sun was setting now, casting an entire palette of oranges and pinks across the deceptively calm waters of Whirlpool country. The only hints to the turbulent currents running below the surface were a few miniscule tremors dotted here and there. Had he been a less observant man, he might have called it beautiful. Perfect, even.

But Kakashi had been trained to look underneath the underneath ever since he could walk. The world was always at war, even while under the illusion of peace.

Looking back over at his three students, who were lying on the sand like a pile of beached marine invertebrates, Kakashi smiled to himself. He'd be nice just this once and collect the wood for their campfire instead of making them do it. Then he decided to do another good deed, and lit the fire himself instead of forcing Ino to practice her fire jutsu. They'd be training even more the next morning, and they needed all the recuperation time they could get. He was considering giving them more time on genjutsu, actually. Just to give Ino a break. She looked exhausted.

See, he _could_ be kind when he wanted to. He just…didn't do it very often.

Oh, well. Baby steps, he supposed. It was kind of like quitting smoking, except Asuma probably never would. Being mean had become a bit of a bad habit for him. Why, just the other day, some random angry desk Chunin had screamed in his face, " _JUST BECAUSE YOU'RE KAKASHI HATAKE, DOESN'T MEAN YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO BEHAVE LIKE A TOTAL ASSHOLE!_ " while waving a copy of his last terrible mission report in his face.

For other people, it might have been cause for some self-reflection. But for Kakashi, he just couldn't bring himself to care. The knowledge that he was a horrible person was nothing new to him, and so he might as well milk it for all it was worth.

Not that it helped him much. No matter what he did, Asuma, or Kurenai, or Gai, or Genma and Aoba and all of them never left him. Oh, sure, they got angry at him sometimes; Kakashi would consider himself a massive failure if he couldn't accomplish _that_ at the very least – but none of them had the self-preservation to distance themselves from him. He wasn't so socially inept that he didn't know the difference between exasperation and hate.

Gai had once told him, in one of their rare serious moments, that while the things he did were sometimes mean, they were also usually very funny, and that as long as the hilarity outweighed all other factors, they'd continue to tolerate it. When Kakashi had pointed out that some of the shit he had put them through just for shits and giggles had been in no way funny, even for the most deranged mind, Gai had patted him on the shoulder and told him that it didn't matter, and that they'd put up with him anyway because they _understood_. ( _Really?_ )

Kakashi had responded to _that_ by pointing out that men like Danzo Shimura also had many very understandable, if extreme, justifications behind all of their subversive actions.

But of course, he and Gai both knew that that wasn't the same thing. His first team had already been claimed by death. This one – this one _had_ to remain intact. He'd be the first to die here, not the last. Not if he could help it.

"Tell me, you three," he asked them, "what do you know of Uzushiogakure?"

"They possessed a great knowledge of sealing techniques, enough to make the major villages fear them," Shikamaru answered, "and for that they were destroyed."

"Is that all the Academy taught you?" Kakashi asked.

Shikamaru shook his head. "They didn't teach us anything, really. They just pointed to it on a map and told us 'it's gone now.' I actually had to look it up in the library to find out why. It was only after a few hours of searching through old war logs that I found the answer, squeezed into one tiny sentence."

"I see," Kakashi murmured. "Well, this was expected. Konoha was very ashamed of this defeat, you see. Uzushiogakure no Sato was one of our greatest allies. The First Hokage's wife, Mito Uzumaki, was from Uzushiogakure no Sato herself. The swirl on the back of all the Jonin vests is the symbol of the Uzumaki clan, the main component of Uzushiogakure - they are now extinct in designation."

"That means that the family name has formally died out, but their people themselves have not," Shikamaru explained at Naruto's quizzical look. "There might be more Uzumaki out there who don't actually call themselves that. For example, Tsunade, one of the Sannin, is a Senju by name, but she has Uzumaki blood through her grandmother Mito. Most of the survivors were women and children. Of the latter, many were orphans when they were transported out of the country, and so they grew up never knowing of their true heritage."

Ino scratched her head. "So what about Naruto?"

Kakashi was about to spout the old S-class secret cover story, but Naruto beat him to the punch. "The Old Man Hokage said that they didn't know who my parents were, so they gave me the name Uzumaki after these guys, I guess. Better than Konohamaru. He literally got named after our village, heh."

"Naruto's a swirly fishcake," Ino snickered.

"No, _you're_ a swirly fishcake."

"Your mom's a swirly fishcake."

"Your swirly fishcake's a mom."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "You guys sure are talkative after all that work – "

"No, it's okay. Go on, sensei," Ino smiled sweetly.

Kakashi cleared his throat. "As I was saying, most of their knowledge on sealing, which was generations in the making, is now all gone. Though Uzushiogakure no Sato was a powerful village – probably the most powerful of the minor villages, actually – it was still tiny in comparison to the others. Naturally, they were crushed when faced with such a large coalition of enemy forces. Konoha was not able to arrive in time to send aid, and that has forever shamed us. Since then we have never failed to help an ally." _Officially._ "Instead of giving up and surrendering, however, they decided to go down fighting. And so, rather than let all of their precious knowledge fall into enemy hands, they simply – " he swept his hands across the ghostly town of ash and fallen earth – "destroyed it all themselves."

"Oh," Ino said sadly, staring at the eerie silhouette the abandoned village cut against the horizon.

"Naruto, your birthday is on October 10th, right?" Shikamaru suddenly asked.

Naruto wrinkled his nose. "Yeah, why?"

Shikamaru looked away, a strange expression on his face. "I was just asking. It doesn't matter."

Kakashi continued his story. "Uzushiogakure was once the world's leader in sealing. They had tens, even hundreds, of sealing _masters_ – not specialists; _masters_ – inside these walls at any given moment in time. I don't mean the standard seal work that we have now – every village has at least a squad of people with good enough handwriting to slap a character or two of chakra-laden calligraphy onto a scroll, and design teams specifically focusing on seal-based projects like security or communication. I mean people who dedicate their livelihoods to this field. People who can fight with nothing but fuinjutsu, people who can singlehandedly capture the great bijuu, people who can look at any situation and just instantaneously invent their own mark for that purpose at the drop of a hat."

"…so who is it now?" Ino asked.

"Now? Now, Konoha is the world's leader," Kakashi answered her. "Anything that could be salvaged went to us, thanks to arrangements done by Mito Uzumaki's descendants."

"And how many do _we_ have?" Naruto asked.

"Throughout our entire history? Five," Kakashi said solemnly. Naruto's face fell. "And of those five, three are dead, one has betrayed Konoha, and none of them were even remotely comparable to the might of an entire village."

The children were silent, stunned. Finally, Shikamaru asked timidly, "Who were they?"

"Mito Uzumaki, the wife of the First Hokage, as you know. She was the first person to capture the Nine-Tails and seal it into herself. She lived to old age, but never became anyone's teacher. Next was Jiraiya – one of the Three Sannin – who taught the Yondaime. The Yondaime's wife was also a sealing master. They both died during the night of the Kyuubi attack. Jiraiya is no longer taking on any students. And of course we've all heard of Orochimaru."

"…What about you, sensei?"

"Yeah, do you know anything about sealing?"

"I can use sealing scrolls, I can use basic theory to customize something more complicated, and I can summon ninken. Better than most, but nowhere near the levels of mastery these people had – before everything went up in smoke, of course," Kakashi told them shortly. To say anything more might lead to inconvenient questions about his teacher, and then he'd have to dance around the subject of Minato-sensei. Though he doubted Hiruzen Sarutobi would execute him for letting "the secret" slip (hell, Naruto already knew half of it anyway thanks to that jerkass Mizuki), making the fact that Naruto was Minato Namikaze's son known might put him in unnecessary danger. Iwagakure was still extremely sore about the whole "one guy with one technique wiped out an entire regiment in under an hour" thing, and there was no telling what they'd end up doing if they found out that he had left behind a convenient target for revenge in the form of a young and untrained son.

"Say…" Shikamaru mused, "can sealing scrolls preserve food?"

"I think they can," said Ino. "Right, sensei?"

"Can they preserve fresh seafood, like sushi, even in a desert?" Shikamaru asked.

Kakashi clapped his hands. " _All right_ , my cute students, it is getting late, and so it is bedtime for all of you now! Chop chop!"

"The sun hasn't even set yet!" Naruto protested.

"Shut up, Naruto!" Ino hissed. "This is Kakashi-sensei we're dealing with! Don't turn down orders to sleep! Tomorrow we'll be complaining 'the sun isn't even up yet'!"

"But don't forget the standard security measures," Shikamaru muttered, reaching for his roll of ninja wire. "Who wants to take first shift?"

"I won't be attacking you tonight," Kakashi promised them.

"Are you going to attack us in the middle of the night and say 'I lied; I'm a shinobi!' when we complained that you promised?" Ino asked dryly.

"I'm wounded that you think so little of me," Kakashi told her. "Seriously, though, all of you go to sleep. I'm planning a great deal of training for you lot tomorrow and I want you to be at full working potential – which will not happen if you do not sleep off that three-hour hike."

"It's still standard Konoha protocol to do night shifts for all defensive purposes, and we can't just make you stay awake all night, sensei," Shikamaru said. "Even if you've probably done it before – you fought in the Third War, right?"

Kakashi smiled at him, though he knew that no one could see it in this light.

 _Sleep_ , he thought, layering a genjutsu over them.

To their credit, all three of them, even Naruto, whose genjutsu skills were quite frankly abysmal, managed to resist it for a few seconds. They succumbed to it in the end, though – and Kakashi would have been disappointed at himself if they hadn't, because this was a standard A-rank taught to all Jonin before they went on infiltration missions.

 _In all honesty_ , Kakashi thought, as he sat beside their peacefully sleeping faces, _there really was no point in coming here. There are many other ways to improve stamina and chakra control. But – it was something that they had to see. Anyway, this is for you, Kushina-san. I know you would have taken your son here at least once in his lifetime, had you been alive._

* * *

 _The next day_

"Sensei, I finished learning all the genjutsu you assigned us – what are you doing?" I asked. Kakashi-sensei was sitting at edge of the water, letting sparks of chakra jump off his fingertips and skid across the waves.

"Things."

"What sort of things?"

"Stuff."

I sighed. "What sort of stuff?"

"Things," he answered, shoulders shaking in a silent giggle. "Just kidding. I'll explain it to you. Call Ino and Naruto over here, too. All of you will be walking back to the mainland shortly and you'll need the rest."

When Ino and Naruto came over, he pointed to the sea. "Contrary to popular belief, water by itself is a very mediocre electric conductor. However, most sources, even freshwater lakes and purified tap water, have various ions dissolved in them. It's these freely floating ions that provide the electrons needed for conduction. Naruto, please tell me you learned about this, at least."

"Yeah, Ino taught me just last week," Naruto said proudly.

Kakashi-sensei gave one of his little half-smiles. "Well, continuing on that note, the human body is actually a conductor. A rather bad one, because lipids, or fats, work as insulators, but if you were to touch an electrocuted person with your bare hands you'd be electrocuted too."

"Wait, then why do people, you know," Naruto interrupted, jerking his body in imitation of an electric shock.

"Because our nerves work by electric impulses. No, we don't have metal wires inside of us. Our nerves simply store the energy using ions and other charged molecules," Kakashi-sensei told him before he could ask. "Small voltages, like the 240V inside a normal house, will cause the nerves in your muscles to freeze up, which is why in most cases people can't move or call for help. They die from being unable to breathe, not the actual electricity. It's the larger shocks – say, 1000V while fixing power plant wires – that blow people across the room and stop their heart."

"Whoa," said Naruto.

"Anyway, this exercise simply helps me test how individual charges travel in comparison to, say, a stream of continuous charges. Lightning chakra behaves differently from actual electricity in certain cases. Knowing the properties of both is necessary in launching a successful nerve based attack, and let me tell you, the human brain is a surprisingly delicate thing – it _can_ and _will_ completely liquefy under the right concentration of charge. To demonstrate, let's connect this watermelon, which we will pretend is someone's head, to a high-voltage capacitor…"

* * *

 _The Hokage's Office_

Hiruzen Sarutobi's eye twitched. Kakashi Hatake _really_ knew how to get on his nerves. Both literally and figuratively. The letter that had arrived on his desk yesterday had some sort of static charge on it that shocked everyone who tried to touch it (save for him, the intended recipient). It had really been a pain in the ass for his paperwork Chunin. (How they got a pain in the _ass_ from touching it with their _fingers_ was something that he still couldn't figure out.)

And if that little prank hadn't told him that yes, it _was_ Kakashi Hatake and not an impostor sending the note to buy more time before forces were sent out looking for a missing team, then it was the irritatingly messy scrawl and the even more irritatingly smug tone in the actual note.

 _SaLUtAtIoNs HoKaGe-SaMa:_

 _TeAm 7 WiLl Be CoMiNg HoMe AbOuT 3 dAyS lAtE cUZ oF a LiTtLe TrAiNiNg DeTouR ;D hOpE tHis DoEsN't MeSs Up YoUr SchEdUlE lOl *(:0)_

 _SInCeReLy,_

 _YOuR fAvOrItE pErSoN eVeR oMG :D_

 _kAkaShI hAtAKe -3-_

 _P.s. I hOpE yOU lIkEd My NeW fOnT. i ThInK i ShOuLd MarKeT iT._ _wHaT dO yOu SaY?_

 _p.S.s. (P.p.S.?) hEre'S a SkAtEbOaRdEr._

dB)-|-(|8

There was a very special hell reserved for people who wrote in alternating caps lock, and Kakashi had just bought himself a one-way ticket there. He was going to make sure Kakashi's life would be very, _very_ painful once he got back.

Well, actually, he had already been planning to make Kakashi's life very, very painful regardless; this letter just made him feel less guilty about it.

* * *

 _Meeting Room 4; Administration Compound East-32_

"All right, settle down, maggots!" Ibiki Morino boomed over the din. "Due to several unforeseen circumstances, we are going to reorganize the _whole_ Chunin Exams! Yes, you heard me right! The _whole. Entire. THING!_ And what's more, we are going to do it _in one day_! Why? Because of reasons that are way above your clearance level! Reasons involving conservative old bastards who, hopefully, won't be hearing about this last-minute revamp until everything has already been put into motion!"

"What the hell?"

"We spent months coming up with this thing, and now we're just going to redo it all at the eleventh hour?"

"Just how special is this 'conservative old bastard' that we have to redesign an entire Chunin exam just for him?"

"Well, at least we'll have a bit of unpredictability this time around."

"Including the third phase? Really?" a rather unwise newbie in the front whispered.

"YES!" Ibiki yelled. "That includes the head proctors, too! So listen up! Starting from the first phase – that part is _completely_ scratched, because guess what? I WON'T BE THERE! And before you ask why, it's because during that time, I will be needed somewhere else, somewhere way above your intelligence clearance level! So count yourselves lucky, maggots. And the wannabe Chunin, who aren't here, can count themselves extra lucky, too."

"Twice lucky, since I won't be there, either," Anko snapped. "The fuckers."

"Which means," Ibiki continued, "that you'll be dealing with our replacements. Shi! Moto! Get up here! They're yours. I'm out of here."

"See ya later, suckers," Anko sang, letting the door slam behind her.

It turned out that though Ibiki had claimed that the Genin would be lucky he wasn't there, they wouldn't be _that_ much luckier. Shi Masa and Moto Kishi were the lesser-known gods of the shinobi world, because they were the sort of guys who could make up illogical things as they went along and somehow still have it all work out. And the fact that _these_ two were going to be the _head planners_ for this thing…

"Right," Masa grinned, clapping his hands together. "We've got a bit of work to do, lads, and you _will be punished_ if it is not done."

* * *

 _Konohagakure no Sato, the Front Gate_

"Sensei, are you _sure_ they'll be fine with us returning three whole days late for a standard C-rank just because of your, uh, 'training detour'?" Shikamaru asked.

"We'll be fine. As long as we got the _messages_ in on time, I'm sure they'll won't mind our well-deserved vacation…" Kakashi trailed off.

There at the front gate, the Hokage himself was waiting for them in all of his pointy-hatted fury.

"Hello, Kakashi. You're _late_."

"…"

"…"

"…Oh, shit."

* * *

 **A/N: Google "High voltage capacitor vs. watermelon" if you're interested in viewing Kakashi's little science demo for yourself.**


	10. The Best-Laid Schemes

BONUS #5:

 _Decoding_

For those of you curious about last chapter's note, the right letters were just hidden wherever the capitalization pattern reversed. Fun little easter egg, for those of you who are bored and have nothing better to do. In no way should this be taken seriously; as people have pointed out, kanji can't be capitalized.

Ich nicht spreche Polish.

* * *

 _The Hokage's Office_

 _This would actually be pretty funny,_ Kakashi thought, _if it wasn't already hilarious._

"There was a _very_ important meeting scheduled yesterday, one that you were _expected_ to be _present_ at," the Hokage scolded him.

"Oh, was there?" Kakashi shrugged. "That's too bad. I didn't realize I was expected anywhere."

"Don't play dumb, Hatake. We both know that _you_ knew you were wanted there. And besides, if you had come home _on time_ I would have been able to formally inform you of that matter," the Hokage told him.

"Well, if you had informed me that you were planning to inform me that I was needed, I actually might have," Kakashi retorted.

"Well, if you had informed me _where you were going_ when you sent home that cute little note of yours, I would have been able to reply and _tell you_ ," the Hokage replied.

"You guys could have easily tracked me if you didn't figure out the code; my scent was all over that thing," Kakashi told him. It wasn't as if his code had been _that_ difficult to decipher, anyway.

"What code – oh. _Oh_." The Hokage looked very, very angry at that.

"What?" Kakashi asked. "I couldn't very well put 'I am taking them to the remnants of a once-powerful allied village of Konoha for reasons that may or may not be important' in an easily intercepted message, right?"

"That doesn't change the fact that you were _still late_ ," the Hokage said, steadily becoming more and more irritated by the second. "This isn't a matter of knowing or not knowing. This is _standard_ protocol that applies to _everybody_ , Kakashi. You might be special in many ways, but this is _not_ one of them."

"It doesn't change the fact that I already missed your meeting," Kakashi shrugged, wondering why the Hokage was taking the time to lecture him on something he already knew. "Oh, well."

"Luckily," the Hokage said dangerously, "I rescheduled it _just for you_. Because you're _just that special_ , aren't you, Kakashi?"

…

…

"…Um," Kakashi swallowed nervously.

"You three may leave," the Sandaime nodded to the three Genin in the room. "I need to, ah, have a nice little conversation with your sensei. Alone."

"Is he in trouble?" Ino asked hopefully.

The Sandaime gave her a dry smile. "Of sorts."

There was a clinking of coins as money exchanged hands.

" _What?_ " Kakashi asked, feigning hurt. "You guys had a tab running on me _getting in trouble_?"

"On how long it would take before the Hokage finally called you out, yeah," Ino said, with a defiantly triumphant expression on her face.

"I hate you guys," Kakashi muttered.

"You deserve it," the Sandaime shrugged, completely unsympathetic.

* * *

"Eh, let's go eat ramen," Naruto yawned. "Nose pays."

"Wait, what?" Ino asked, as he and Shikamaru immediately put their fingers to their noses.

"Haha!" Naruto cheered. "Ino's paying!"

" _What?_ Why me?"

"Because you didn't touch your nose," Naruto explained, as if that was the most sensible thing in the world.

Ino turned red with anger. "Ex _cuse_ me, but that's just _stupid_!"

"You _do_ have the most money out of all of us right now," Shikamaru shrugged. "Because of the bet, you know."

"Yeah, and I'm hungry, and it's your fault I don't have money," Naruto chimed in.

"What, so I get punished for winning the bet? I'll _lose_ more money than I gained from your silly little bet with the way _you_ eat ramen!" Ino yelled. "Besides, why are you blaming your lack of money on _me_? It's your fault for taking the bet in the first place, and then betting wrong! And besides, it isn't 'Nose pays'! It's 'Nose _goes_ '! 'Nose pays' doesn't even _rhyme_!"

"It doesn't have to!" Naruto said.

" _Who_ said so?" Ino asked. Naruto stopped short. Then, he grinned brightly as he decided upon a clearly indisputable answer.

"…I did!"

"What? Who said you could make the rules?" Ino yelled, grabbing Naruto's ear, to the boy's pained protests. "I'm the only girl on this team, so therefore _I_ get to be the boss! And the boss makes the rules! So therefore, _my_ rule is that _you_ take responsibility for your own irresponsible eating and spending habits and pay for your _own_ stupid ramen!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa. One, ramen is _not_ stupid, because ramen is like, the best food ever, and two, who said being the only girl on the team means that you're the boss?" Naruto asked.

"…I did!" Ino responded triumphantly.

"Well, clearly, the logic of our 'boss of this team' debate has taken on the form of an infinite recursive loop," Shikamaru muttered.

"A what?" Naruto asked, scratching his head.

"He means an autocracy justified by the autocrat," Ino smirked.

Naruto frowned. "Oi! Stop using big words to confuse me! Don't think I can't see you smiling like that!"

"See, the rules also state that the boss has to know how to use big words properly, and since you don't even know what they mean, you're automatically ruled out as boss," Ino told him. "And also, I was born on September 23rd and you were born on October 10th, so that means that I'm older than you are, and that means I'm the boss of _you_."

"But Shikamaru was born on September 22nd, so he's older than _you_. By a day," Naruto said. "That means that Shikamaru gets to be the boss. Right, Shikamaru?"

"Shikamaru, if you make me pay for Naruto's ramen, I'm telling my mom who will tell my dad who will tell _your_ dad who will tell your _mom_ ," Ino warned.

"…I changed my mind, Naruto. Pay for your own ramen," Shikamaru grinned.

"WHAT?" Naruto yelled. "Shikamaru, I was counting on you! You two-timing traitor!"

"That's _alliteration_ ," said Ino. "Anyone who uses alliteration in an insult is automatically disqualified from candidacy for being the team boss when Kakashi-sensei isn't around."

"…Is it just me, or is Kakashi-sensei's insanity mildly contagious?..." Shikamaru asked.

Ino and Naruto paused and looked at him, then at each other, and back at him. Naruto narrowed his eyes and stroked his invisible beard. "Nah, it's just you," he finally concluded.

"Yep. Definitely just you," Ino agreed. "…And since I backed you up on that one, I no longer have to pay for your ramen."

"WHAT? That doesn't even make any sense!"

* * *

Contrary to the highly entertaining discussion about ramen that Kakashi's three students were having outside (he could hear them through the window, and it seemed like they were having a _lot_ more fun than he was), the atmosphere inside the Hokage's office was extremely, well, _un_ entertaining. He was not happy, and the Sandaime knew that Kakashi knew that.

Which only made it worse for the two of them.

"You had something you wished to talk with me about, Hokage-sama?" Kakashi asked. "Because if it was about me missing that meeting, it really couldn't be helped. You see – "

"I don't need any of your ridiculous excuses, Hatake," the Sandaime snapped. "I had enough of that with Obito, thank you very much." Kakashi visibly winced, and Hiruzen pushed down the guilt that came from bringing up such a painful memory. It really couldn't be helped, though. Sometimes, only words that remarkably cutting could keep him in line. Kakashi himself used those same tactics to manipulate others. So he really shouldn't be feeling the least bit guilty doing the same thing in return.

"Sir," Kakashi cleared his throat.

"Yes. The meeting. The one where you were supposed to submit your Chunin exam nominations. It was rescheduled to tomorrow. And I don't want a word out of you, Hatake," the Hokage held up his hand when Kakashi's jaw lowered to protest. "We both know you delayed your return on purpose. I'm asking you why."

"Why?" Kakashi asked, eye narrowing. "I don't see why I had to be there. I'm not nominating my team. I thought that much was obvious, when I didn't even bother to come back even five hours late. But just in case it wasn't clear, I'll tell it to you plain and simply right now: they will not be taking the upcoming Chunin exams."

 _Well, isn't this just lovely._ He had been hoping to avoid this conversation. But it was a foolish hope. Kakashi was not Asuma or Kurenai or Gai; he knew better than any of them that an early promotion was more of a punishment than a reward.

"I beg to differ. Yes, they will be."

"What? I think, as their Jonin instructor, I have the power to withhold my nomination – "

"And as the Hokage, I have the power to command you to give your nomination."

The temperature in the room was stifling as the two of them glared at each other. In the end, it was Kakashi who caved first, and he choked out, " _Why?_ " The betrayed look on his face made Hiruzen's heart wrench, but the Sandaime was less than moved by his sentiment.

"It is for their own safety."

"What? _How_ is that for their own safety?" Kakashi rasped, his voice slowly rising in volume. "The difference in skill between a high Genin and a low Chunin is very little, Hokage-sama. In fact, there are Genin who are more skilled than Chunin, but simply haven't advanced yet because of bad luck. Yet, Chunin are cleared to go out and risk their lives on frontline battle missions, while Genin are not. And given the situation with Sand, Wave, and Cloud right now, this will not end well. They're only _twelve_ , Hokage-sama. It's too early for them, no matter how skilled they are. I'm not going to let them go out there and – "

" _You_ were only _six_ when you became Chunin," the Sandaime reminded him.

"Yes, and what a model human being I turned out to be, hmmm?" Kakashi spat bitterly, and for a second there his true self was showing through the layers of idiocy and sarcasm and puerile insanity – a self-loathing, guilt-torn veteran who had seen and done and taken and given and _lost_ too much too early.

Hiruzen Sarutobi ran a hand through his hair. He _really_ was getting too old for this. But the Sandaime forced him to say, "I don't care, Kakashi."

"Well, _I_ kind of do!" Kakashi exploded in reply. "It's the least you could tell me in return. I come home from a regular C-rank expecting some kind of briefing on this whole Hidden Cloud and Wave Country clusterfuck, and instead I'm told that I'm supposed to enter my _team_ into this potentially deadly competition for an even deadlier reward disguised as a rank advancement! And after all that, it's somehow _my_ fault that I didn't enter them just because I took them home late, even though I didn't _know_ that you meant for me to come home on time so you could _tell_ me all this, and thus didn't plan accordingly."

"Well, barring the fact that you are expected to return home on time _anyway_ , if you had _told_ me where you were _going_ , maybe I would have been able to reply with the reason of _urgency_ ," the Hokage reminded him. "And stop trying to pull that 'I didn't know' card on me. I dropped about a thousand hints regarding your team being ready for the exams in the past month alone."

"Oh, not this again," Kakashi groaned. "Look, before you lay into me about how I didn't follow protocol by not telling you _where_ I'd be during our fake vacation, I took them to Whirlpool Country, okay? No, I'm not going to waste time trying to explain to you _why_ , because you _know_ why. And before you express sarcastic surprise, _yes_ , I am still capable of sentiment, and _no_ , I did not let the S-class secret slip. Unlike pretty much the _fucking rest of Konoha_."

He pinched the bridge of his nose. "Look. How about we…move away from that? Back to our initial point of discussion?"

Kakashi crossed his arms. "Yes. Let's. Something about entering fresh Genin into the Chunin exams _even though I don't want to_ – what could _possibly_ justify that drivel you just spouted at me, old man – "

"If you hadn't noticed, Kakashi, this year's graduating class was almost entirely composed of clan children… _and_ child prodigies. Your team alone could put many of our _jonin_ to shame. I know you've been teaching them B-rank and A-rank ninjutsu, Kakashi. I've even observed Shikamaru experimenting with a few of his own earth jutsu derivatives and original techniques. A mere Chunin exam – that's almost _nothing_ , compared to some other _very real_ dangers that exist in this world, Kakashi," the Sandaime snapped, nearing the end of his patience.

"A mere Chunin exam? A _mere_ Chunin exam? I don't know what planet _you're_ living on, but this will be no _mere_ Chunin exam. Or have you forgotten that the Hidden Sand has been invited to participate in this thing, too? So I'm being completely hysterical, but I'm not acting this way for no reason, Hokage-sama! You _know_ they're planning something; we've _known_ they've been planning something for _months_ now! This round of Chunin exams _will be_ when they'll strike; I'd wager my firstborn child on that!"

"Don't make empty wagers, Kakashi. We both know no woman will be bearing you children."

"It's an _expression_! Anyway, that's not the point; the point is – "

" _The point is_ YES, I already know that, and YES, I have already taken precautions against them to the best of my ability! Most of the Chunin proctors from the first round and all of the Chunin proctors from the second round have been replaced with disguised ANBU. We'll have teams tracking all the Genin at all times – "

"So you _do_ know that Sand is planning something, then! Great! Would you like to explain to me, then, how in hell are you justified in _knowingly_ entering Rookie Genin into something that you _knowingly_ understand involves another entire _hidden village_ – "

"If you would let me explain – "

" – It's total insanity! And that means a lot, coming from me!" Kakashi exploded, his front of calmness completely gone. "What the hell, old man – they're my _team_ – you can't just put them there; you can't just _take them away_ from me like that – you can't fucking do that to me, you – you just _can't_ – "

 _Ah, so that's what the problem is. Of course. That's_ always _the problem with Kakashi. For the love of the Rikudo…_

The Sandaime exhaled. "One, I am your Hokage; I _can_ and I _will_. End of story. Two, I'm not doing this to _take them away_ from you – this is not some petty revenge against you for your obnoxious behavior; this is a _legitimate security issue_ that I have been planning against for _months!_ There are plenty of other people who want those children hurt and I am _not_ one of them. We are dealing with very serious situation right now, so for the love of the gods, be _logical_ – "

"But what _if_ – "

The Sandaime could take it no longer. Slamming his hands on his desk, he shot out of his chair, towering over Kakashi, despite him being the shorter one of the two. "For the _last time,_ Hatake! _Whatever Sand is planning will pose no danger to these children directly._ They want money; they want to discredit Konoha; they want to draw more business to themselves. That's all. But they have no interest in actually kidnapping and inducting these children into their own private forces – unlike a certain Councilman who disagrees with me on how we should teach our children. A certain Councilman who, _as we speak_ , is devising a hundred and one new ways to steal this hat from me!"

Those words finally stunned Kakashi into silence. But not for long. A man with such experience in violence would not be so easily cowed by a few angry words.

"Oh, _fuck_ me. _Him_ again?"

"Yes, _him again_.As such, they will have to take these exams while I deal with _him again_ , because the children are untouchable while they are still busy competing. This is the one thing he doesn't have any control over. All I need is a month, Kakashi. _Please._ Danzo Shimura is more dangerous than the Hidden Sand any day."

"To _you_ , and your cute little political plots, maybe, but to _me_ , at least Danzo Shimura isn't going to end up killing them," Kakashi responded coldly. He had completely shut down by now. Which was good, because he was no longer freaking out, but also bad, because a pissed-off Kakashi was something no sane man would want to tango with for any longer than he had to.

"You're right. Danzo Shimura won't kill them. He'll only do _worse_ than that."

"Fuck Danzo Shimura. Why don't you just get rid of him already, if you hate him so much?"

It was a question he already knew the answer to, but Kakashi simply wasn't the right type of person to see this mess properly at first glance. It wasn't that he was one of those all-combat-no-politics shinobi, because Kakashi was definitelyas manipulative as the rest of them. Ever since he could talk, he had been wringing out concessions in any argument he ever involved himself in. As for bargaining skills, the cheapskate could magically get stranglehold grips over every possible good deal that presented itself to him.

But his true political skills lay in _planning_. Kakashi was a _planner_ , at the end of the day, and a very efficient one at that. And therein lay the problem. He was just too damn efficient for his own good, and bureaucracy was the death of efficiency. For all of his inexplicable wildness and unpredictability, Kakashi Hatake was a very logical person. His actions might not have translated his thought processes very well, but Hiruzen knew that every path his brain took was a path that actually made sense.

Unlike fucking Danzo Shimura, who didn't seem to understand that those fanatically devoted human robots he called shinobi were shit for infiltration missions.

 _Kakashi, please,_ please _see reason, and just follow my orders,_ please _,_ Hiruzen pleaded frantically. _You know I only want what's safest for those children. Just because you're not scared of Danzo Shimura doesn't mean I'm not._

At this, the Sandaime snorted. _I am_ not _afraid of Danzo Shimura. But I refuse to let him use any chaos caused by the Hidden Sand to further his own agenda. Shikaku Nara knows why. Inoichi Yamanaka knows why. Shibi Aburame knows why. Hell, even Hiashi Hyuga, who hates everyone, agrees with me on this. Why won't you?_

"If you tell me every single little thing he's had his fingers tangled in since day one, I will," the Sandaime said. "When he dies, a _lot_ of things are going to fall apart – things that we aren't prepared to deal with all at once. We have to secretly and gradually dismantle his little side projects before we can make any other moves – something I'm already having a lot of trouble with as it is."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow sarcastically. "Need help?"

"Look, Kakashi, if you're so worried about them, the ANBU commander and I can turn a blind eye to whatever non-mission activity you get up to, as we always have," the Sandaime growled, trying to sound fed up with the boy's overprotective-parent tendencies despite the fact that Hiruzen actually found it extremely endearing. "I can't let you engage directly as their Jonin teacher, officially, but I obviously have no control over a highly eccentric and unstable individual acting independently. If you get caught, the Genin in question might be disqualified at worst – or best, depending on how you look at it."

Kakashi stopped to consider this proposal. "Out of curiosity, what did Asuma and Kurenai have to say about this?"

"Nothing, really. They were planning to enter their students anyway."

"Oh, okay. That makes it _all_ better," Kakashi said sarcastically.

The Sandaime pinched the bridge of his nose. "Let's compromise, shall we? Let me write their names down for this one thing. One month, Kakashi. That's all I ask. One month, for me to keep them out of Danzo Shimura's hands. Once it's all over, I won't promote them to Chunin without your permission, until they turn sixteen and are allowed to make these decisions for themselves."

"And what about _during_ the exams?" Kakashi asked.

"I thought we made it clear earlier that we have already done everything we could to make sure none of them die," the Sandaime said flatly.

Kakashi swallowed, but remained silent, like a petulant child. Hiruzen Sarutobi sighed.

"You know in times like this we cannot give any foreigners the impression that the situation in Konoha is anything but perfectly normal – "

" _I know_ ," Kakashi growled.

Of course he did. Hatake noses and ears – better than the Inuzaka, supposedly. But only for two generations. And no more after that, if Hiruzen's suspicions about Kakashi's preferences were correct. "Then you understand?"

Kakashi seemed like he wanted to throw another tantrum, but eventually, he let out a long breath and swallowed his anger. " _Fine,_ " he huffed.

"I know you hate me for this, Kakashi…so remember that I'm a government-sanctioned military dictator above all else," the Sandaime replied, equally curt.

"I still don't agree with this," Kakashi growled.

Hiruzen sighed. "I didn't expect you to." _I don't agree with me, either. You're right about me, you know. I'm a horrible, horrible person._

 _Shut up; you know this is the best way,_ the Sandaime snapped. _Danzo Shimura or Sunagakure? Please._

* * *

 _Main meeting room, the Hokage Tower, 11:30 A.M._

"…Tibo Kute, Hideruya Himakaz, and Ayama Torikira…"

"…I nominate my team, Team 4…"

"…Tama Gin, Ina Yashu, and Ruroshin Kenrouni…"

And so it went. One by one, each Jonin went by, until, finally,

"I, Maito Gai, nominate Team 9, Neji Hyuga, Tenten, and Rock Lee."

And then all eyes were on the three rookie sensei.

The Hokage looked at him expectantly.

Kakashi swallowed, and then pasted a stupid grin onto his face. "I, Kakashi Hatake, nominate my lovely minions – I mean, my three cute students, Shikamaru Nara, Ino Yamanaka, and Naruto Uzumaki for the Chunin exams."

(" _WHAT?_ But they're rookies!")

"Then I, Asuma Sarutobi, nominate Team 10 for the Chunin Exams: Choji Akimichi, Sasuke Uchiha, and Hinata Hyuga."

"And I, Kurenai Yuuhi, nominate Team 8: Sakura Haruno, Kiba Inuzaka, and Shino Aburame."

(" _ALL_ the rookies?")

The Hokage nodded. "If that's all, then – "

"Excuse me, Hokage-sama, but I must protest!" some Chunin suddenly stood up. Ah, right. That was their Academy teacher. Good guy, if a little misguided. He had treated Naruto like an actual human being despite being the Kyuubi jinchuuriki, so that was points in Kakashi's book as far as he was concerned. Although he still didn't remember the guy's name.

"Don't bother, Umino." (Oh, so that was his name.)

"Yeah, he's nuts anyway."

"I don't care!" loud guy kept saying. (What was his name again?) "They just graduated from the Academy six months ago! They're not ready!"

 _You don't say?_ Kakashi thought sarcastically, but then the Hokage gave him a sharp look, and Kakashi sighed, holding his hands up in an "I give" gesture. "Listen. I don't know who you are and I don't particularly care. But those kids are no longer babies in your care. They are my soldiers, and I will command them as I see fit. Besides, a little failure will be good for them. Show them a taste of the real world." He shot a look at the Hokage. _There, happy?_

 _Yes, very._

"You expect them to fail?" loud guy asked.

"No, I expect them to pass. That's why I nominated them," Kakashi told him with finality.

 _Unfortunately._

* * *

 **A/N: If you couldn't tell before, I suck at making up Japanese names.**


	11. Chemicals and Snake

_Training Ground 3_

"You're nominating us for the Chunin exams?" Ino asked. "But we've only been Genin for six months. Are you sure we're ready?"

"As ready as you'll ever be," Kakashi-sensei told us. "Trust me. You'll be fine. Besides, Asuma and Kurenai also nominated their teams, so it's not as if you'll be the only newbie squirts there. All of you are passing material. The exams are nothing to worry about."

Naruto grinned. "Really? You're not just saying that to make us feel good?"

"Well, compared to the other things you'll have to deal with…"

"That's not very reassuring."

"I heard from, uh, _places_ that it's the biggest one yet," said Ino. "There will be lots of foreigners."

"Yes, about that…see, it's not the exams themselves that are particularly scary. It's your fellow competitors that you have to watch out for…"

Naruto scratched his head. "Like who?"

Kakashi-sensei sighed. "Do you remember that conversation we had about Sunagakure during our first C-rank?"

I frowned. "Are you suspecting that Suna will use these Chunin exams to start something?" _That plan seems a bit too blatantly obvious to succeed…_

"Something like that, yes," Kakashi-sensei nodded.

"So why are we being entered, then?" I asked immediately.

Kakashi-sensei gave me a strange look. _Of course_ you _would ask something like that._

I returned it with a look of my own. _So you_ do _know something. What?_

Instead of answering my question directly, he said, "Either way, we can't cancel the exams, or else we'll look weak in front of spectators and other villagers. The show must go on. I'm not allowed to tell you any more than that. They can't know that we know what they're up to. More importantly, don't trust anyone, not even your former classmates, not even the proctors, and least of all the 'friendly strangers'. It is only you and your team in something like this. Judge them the same way you judge me, and you should be fine." _Be careful. Keep each other safe. Watch out for the Councilman._

I raised an eyebrow. _The Councilman?_

"And you think we can go up against _that_?" Ino blurted.

Kakashi's eyelid flickered for a moment. "I believe you'll live, yes."

"…"

"…"

"…All _RIGHT!_ " Naruto jumped up and cheered. "We'll kick everyone's butts and blow this stupid test out of the water! And then we'll be Chunin before you know it, Sensei! You can count on us! Right, guys?"

I couldn't help but smile. "At the risk of sounding like my dad, it _would_ be troublesome to have to go through something like this more than once." _Don't worry, sensei. We'll live._

"It would be embarrassing if we _didn't_ pass," Ino shook her head. "I refuse to have given up all of my cool outfits for nothing." She glared at Kakashi-sensei pointedly.

"But you look cute in baggy army pants," he said innocently. "Or at least, Lee seems to think so."

"Don't you _dare_ say a word," Ino fumed. "And no _ORANGE_ , Naruto!"

* * *

 _The Chunin Exams, Phase 1_

Shi Masa did not regard himself as a normally happy man. Today, he was even less happy than normal. He had a million better things to do than to proctor a bunch of stuck-up Genin brats who thought that they were good enough for Chunin, least of all the stupid Rookies who all also happened to be clan heirs.

His sentiment mirrored that of the rest of the room – everyone absolutely _hated_ them. He had had to _work_ for his position as Jonin, damn it, and here these cute and naïve little things thought they could just waltz in and out all because they were born with weird-ass eyes or something similar. Which was _so_ not fair; most people with screwy genetics got cancer or cystic fibrosis or some shit, not actual superpowers.

Now, that in itself was fine – he could have dealt with that – but then the Sandaime had pulled him aside and told him something about making a test that those kids could pass.

 _What the hell,_ man?

All right, so he was intending for them to pass just so they could show them off, and not because he was going to _actually_ make them Chunin, which was a little bit better, but still. Stupid entitled rich brats. He couldn't help but hate them, even though he knew exactly what they were here for, because a little part of him couldn't bear to think of the fact that those Rookies might actually have the raw talent to pass, even without extra help.

At least he'd be able to have his share of fun terrorizing them before he booted them off to the second phase. This particular room had been chosen _because_ it had no air conditioning. Add that to the sweltering Konoha heat, and the little brats would be crying in no time. He and the other proctors, of course, were all carrying their own spray-bottle fans – none of which would be shared with the Genin. And just to tack on insult to injury for the Genin who were fluent in either water or air jutsu…

"LISTEN UP, MAGGOTS!" he screamed, imitating Ibiki – hey, it worked – "THERE WILL BE ABSOLUTELY NO FIGHTING IN THIS PHASE OF THE EXAM! YES, YOU SMUG LITTLE DICKWAD FROM THE SOUND VILLAGE, I AM TALKING TO YOU! SO WIPE THAT SMIRK OFF YOUR FACE, OR I WILL PERSONALLY COME OVER THERE AND DO IT FOR YOU! NO TAIJUTSU, GENJUTSU, NINJUTSU, OR ANYTHING ELSE WITH 'JUTSU' TACKED ONTO THE END, _PERIOD_! IF WE CATCH YOU USING ANYTHING BESIDES YOUR PENCILS, BRAINS, AND PIECE OF PAPER, YOU ARE DISQUALIFIED! AM I UNDERSTOOD, MAGGOTS?"

"Heh. No fighting?" the little dickwad muttered to his friends. "What a bunch of wimps. This will be easier than I thought." Suddenly, he let out a high-pitched shriek – and _holy shit_ , he didn't think it was possible for a post-pubescent boy to scream that _high_. "Something bit me!"

"Good job, girl," he grinned, patting his mouse summon.

 _That guy tasted disgusting_ , his summon told him.

"Aw, does he not wash like a good boy should?" he cooed sarcastically.

 _He tasted like chemicals and snake_ , the mouse corrected. _It was nasty._

"I'll give you some extra high quality cheese later," he promised.

 _You better._ The summon disappeared in a puff of smoke.

The rest of the room was still snickering at the now-humiliated dickwad. Good. He always liked taking those types of overconfident bastards down a peg or ten. He leveled a challenging glare at the nine Rookie Genin, praying silently that they'd do something like that, too, just so he could embarrass them, but they all remained silent. Shi sighed. No one in the room was going to fall for the same bait twice.

"NOW LISTEN CAREFULLY, YOU DISGUSTING GRUBS. I'M ONLY GOING TO TELL YOU THE INSTRUCTIONS ONCE, SO DON'T YOU DARE ASK ME AGAIN. IF YOU MISS WHAT I'M SAYING, THEN _OH WELL_! TOO BAD SO SAD! NO QUESTIONS, GOT IT? I DON'T HAVE TIME FOR YOUR FLY-SHIT BRAINS! _NOW_ …"

* * *

Sakura gripped her pencil tightly as she waited for the tests to be distributed. None of the competition looked friendly. The kid from Sand least of all.

She really, _really_ did not like that guy. The way he stared did not suit her well. Even without that weird Kabuto guy's advice, she would have avoided him anyway. Still, she had gotten some pretty interesting information from him. For example, Ino, Shikamaru, and even _Naruto_ , had really high scores – same as Sasuke – for the elemental ninjutsu category in the skill set diagram. She had been extremely surprised at that, especially since no one in _her_ team knew _any_.

Although, to be fair, her team had the highest genjutsu scores out of all the rookie Genin, so it was likely just a matter of focus for their respective Jonin sensei. Sakura doubted she had the chakra to use too much elemental ninjutsu anyway.

Speaking of Ino and Naruto…Kurenai-sensei had informed her that the other two rookie teams were both entered, but she hadn't noticed Ino there. Or Naruto. There was no way she could have missed his neon orange jumpsuit. Had they backed out? Neither Ino nor Naruto were the types to give up like that.

She peered over the cubicles again, trying to find either of them one last time. No luck. Not a spot of orange, or even purple. She did see Lee in his ugly green jumpsuit, though, and hastily ducked back down before he spotted her and did something stupid that would get both of them kicked out. That would be really bad. Sasuke-kun was there, though, so that was a small comfort.

"NOW LISTEN UP, BITCHES," the really angry-sounding proctor yelled. "YOU SHOULD ALL HAVE A PIECE OF PAPER IN FRONT OF YOU NOW. DON'T YOU FUCKING DARE TURN IT OVER UNTIL WE TELL YOU TO, OR YOU FAIL! AND STOP TRYING TO READ THROUGH THE BACK OF THE PAPER! THAT'S RIGHT, I'M WATCHING YOU, YOU LITTLE SHITS!"

There was some uncomfortable shuffling as several people jerked back upright.

"YOU HAVE ONE HOUR! IF YOU DON'T FINISH YOUR TEST BEFORE TIME IS UP, _YOU FAIL!_ IF YOU GET THE ANSWERS _WRONG_ , YOU _FAIL_! IF YOU CHEAT OFF SOMEONE FROM A DIFFERENT TEAM, YOU _FAIL_! IF YOU ARE CAUGHT TRYING TO COMMUNICATE WITH YOUR TEAMMATES, _YOU FAIL!_ AND IF ANYONE IN YOUR TEAM FAILS, YOU _ALSO FAIL!_ "

 _Wait – what?_ Sakura gasped. _You can't be serious!_ She opened her mouth to protest, but one murderous glare from Shi-san had her snapping it shut again, and she resorted to worriedly searching the room for Kiba and Shino instead. All the teams had been pried apart and separated in the beginning when they were given their seating arrangements, and now they were saying that this whole thing was graded by team?

Shi-san paced back and forth across the aisles, his heavy boots leaving loud and visible indents in the wooden floorboards. "THE INSTRUCTIONS ARE WRITTEN ON YOUR TEST, AND IF YOU'RE TOO STUPID TO UNDERSTAND THEM THEN DON'T YOU DARE COME WHINING TO US! YOU'RE SUPPOSED TO BE CHUNIN-LEVEL ALREADY! SO SHOW US THAT YOU ARE – BECAUSE I DON'T TAKE VERY KINDLY TO HAVING MY PRECIOUS TIME WASTED, UNDERSTOOD?!"

"Yes, sir!" the crowd of Genin chorused.

"IF THAT'S ALL, THEN – _BEGIN_!"

Sakura flipped over her sheet and was met with a single line of text.

 _Solve this code. The key is: 872AF64._

Underneath it was a large blank space, presumably where the answer was supposed to go.

 _What?_ Sakura thought, flipping the paper back over, trying to see if there was something that she had missed on the other side the first time around. _Where's the code?_ She was about to raise her hand to ask about it, when someone behind her raised his.

"Excuse me, sir, but you didn't give me a code to solve – "

 _THWACK!_

"I _said_ NO. FUCKING. _QUESTIONS!_ " the head proctor roared, brandishing a kunai. Sakura turned behind her to look, as did some other people in her row. A dagger had embedded itself in the front of the person's cubicle board. Had it not been stopped by its own hilt, the weapon surely would have found its mark in the middle of the question-asker's head.

Sakura quietly withdrew her trembling hand and stared hopelessly back down at her sheet.

 _How do you solve a code…_

* * *

… _when there is no code to solve?_ I thought. _There's only a key…_

I looked around. At least I wasn't the only one. _Judging from the amount of people who are actually working on this thing compared to the amount of people who are just staring confusedly, I'm guessing about two-thirds of the room doesn't have the code, either._ There was a rustle of paper, and the person beside me held up his paper to the light, possibly to test for invisible ink. There was a muffled curse, and he slammed it back down onto his desk again.

Now that was odd. His test paper had been completely blank. Not even a code or a key. Not that _"7229CCR"_ helped me any more. I looked around at the room one more time. That was when an idea came to me – what if the codes and keys (and blank papers) were all distributed separately around the room?

But then how would I find the particular code that this key was for among all the test-takers in the room? Unless…

I narrowed my eyes, and quickly scanned the room for my teammates. Ino had her head down, working furiously, and Naruto was scratching his head.

Next, Team 8. Neither Sakura nor Kiba were working, while Shino was buzzing agitatedly. And then Team 9, Gai's team. Neji and Tenten were not working, while Lee was crying hopelessly, holding a snapped pencil in his hand. Team 10 – Hinata and Sasuke were both not working, while Choji was frantically writing away at his paper. The Sand team – the same one we had met during our first C-rank – also had only one person, the youngest kid, working, while the other two just sat there. And then the team of the guy with glasses that had approached the other Rookies with those strange cards before ( _be careful around him; team training is supposed to be private and yet he somehow knows your skill set_ ) – the same thing. Only one person was working. The Sound team, that had been called out earlier was in a similar situation, too.

 _It's not just a coincidence that only one third of the room – or, more specifically, one third of each three-man cell – is working. One person has a key, one person has a code, and one person has a blank piece of paper. It's also unlikely that this pattern is random, otherwise it would take too long for anything to get done. The codes and their corresponding keys are confined to the same team – that is, each code-key-blank set has been distributed among only one team._ I replayed the head proctor's instructions inside my head. _We have to solve the problem, which is, in this case, deciphering the code. We are not allowed to cheat off other teams…but we only fail if we get_ caught _communicating with our own…and the whole team fails if one member either doesn't get the answer or cheats poorly…_

I sat up and snorted to myself. Hah. This was just typical Kakashi-sensei speak. _Look underneath the underneath._ This test wasn't about codebreaking, not if keys were floating around a third of the room – it was about being able to piece together information from many remote sources and communicating your findings to the rest of the field before your teammates got desperate and did something stupid. Just like how Tora prepared us for future tracking/capturing missions, this was a mock intelligence mission preparing us for the real deal.

When large areas have to be covered in a short amount of time by limited personnel, teams have to split up and take different parts. And, if the area is full of enemies – that is, the rival teams and our proctors – we might not be able to regroup, so being able to send messages remotely was an important skill. Important pieces of information are rarely ever kept in one piece, for security reasons – one of the major jobs of ANBU Intelligence HQ was to put together all the various bits and pieces brought back by the scouts so they could be analyzed in full.

Hand signs and various signals, obviously, could be spotted by the proctors, even if they didn't know what it meant. Knocking Morse Code or other auditory means of communication were also out of the question. I looked around at the examiners, wondering just what I could get away with.

* * *

Ino frowned down at the paper. _This is ridiculous_ , she thought. _This code is_ way _too long to brute-force in only one hour –_

Suddenly, she felt frozen, like she couldn't move. Then her arm started moving against her mind, and began writing on the paper. _Oh. It was just Shikamaru._ She relaxed, and let her hand move seemingly according to its own will. _This entire room is covered in shadows thanks to all the cubicles,_ she thought. _I can't even see his shadow._

 _7229CCR_

 _Perfect,_ Ino smirked, as she resumed her work. _I might not be a bookworm like Sakura, but if there's one thing I know how to do, it's a standard decryption. Stay calm and don't screw up, Naruto. I'll give you the answers soon enough._

* * *

Sasuke grinned when he finally saw Hinata activate her Byakugan and start writing. _Factor in the Sharingan, and_ bingo _._ He let his arm movements copy hers, and soon words were forming on his paper. _And Choji's sitting across from me, too. That works out perfectly – otherwise, it would have been hard to hypnotize people when they're not making direct eye contact._

* * *

 _Hang in there, Lee,_ Tenten thought. _Neji's almost done deciphering the code. I'll get the answers to you soon enough._

* * *

 _Bugs are so weird,_ Kiba thought, tracing out the words the kikaichu were forming on the paper, _but at least they're useful._

* * *

Temari hadn't expected Gaara to help either her or Kankuro, so it came as a mildly pleasant surprise when the sand came and started scratching out the words on her paper. Logically, she knew Gaara was only doing that because he still needed them, but something was better than nothing. If only that bloody smell could go away, this might actually turn out to be a nice day.

* * *

 _Is that girl actually_ sleeping _during this test?_ Shi thought furiously. _Oh. Never mind. She's a Yamanaka. Damn. That's one thing we can't actually prove. And – shit – this whole place is covered with shadows, huh? That's another thing we can't prove._

 _Effing hell! Who was the idiot who thought cubicles would be a good idea?_

 _Oh, right. That was me. Ha-ha._

 _It's so stupid that we can't call them out. Seriously. If_ I _was doing this, I'd nail the two Hyuga kids – those bulging veins on your temples are super obvious, hello? And then that girl with the ninja wire tired to her fingers, and then those damn kikaichu, and the Sharingan boy, and hell, even that brat with the sand. And what the hell, I should just kick out that team from Sound, too, just because I know that they're cheating. They're a new village. No one from a new village makes it through_ that _easily…_

He felt kind of bad for that Kabuto kid, though. This was what, the sixth? seventh? time he'd be taking the test? What a try-hard.

"EXAMINEE NUMBER 94! YOU FAIL!"

"I wasn't – ACK!"

"IDIOT! YOU THINK WE DON'T KNOW WHAT HAND SIGNS LOOK LIKE?"

"NUMBER 17! TAKE YOUR TEAM AND GET OUT OF HERE! NUMBER 112, 65, AND 71! YOU ALSO FAIL! SAVE YOUR EXCUSES, I SAW YOU PEEKING AROUND THAT CUBICLE AS CLEAR AS DAY!"

Not that it would have helped the stupid bastard. Every team had been given a different message, and he was looking forward to booting out the teams that had cheated "successfully" when time was up.

Idiots.

* * *

I sighed, and leaned back in my chair. _That was easy._

I glanced around the room again, using the rest of my time here to observe the rest of the competitors. I focused mainly on the Sand teams, as Kakashi-sensei had warned…but there was something about the one Konoha team in purple that was just… _off_ …

Though we hadn't talked to him directly, I had managed to get a glimpse of the cards he was showing off to our former classmates. The level of detail in those skill reports...

Since when did a _Genin_ have that sort of power? How could he have gotten his hands on those statistics? I could deal with the guy knowing how many missions everyone had gone on – though legally the mission record room files were only open to Chunin-level paper pushers and up, it was all too easy for an overly curious Genin to pick the lock (hell, Kakashi-sensei had sent us in there on mock missions once or twice before). And the ninjutsu, fine – that could be inferred based on clan jutsu and our sensei.

But specific number rankings? Elemental natures? The _names_ of the techniques we'd been taught? That sort of knowledge wasn't recorded _at all_ past the Academy. No self-respecting ninja village left a list of their employees' skills out for the world to see. One break-in, and it would all be over. The only people who should have known our skill sets, besides our parents, would be Kakashi-sensei. And I was fairly certain he wasn't the type to make that sort of information about us known to the general public, seeing how secretive and antisocial he normally was about _everything_.

So either he was _amazingly_ good at analyzing skill stats from mere gossip alone, or there was a third party going around, spying on teams and analyzing skill sets.

 _Crap. I've got to tell someone about this._

Luckily for me, then, that none of the Chunin proctors in the room were actually Chunin.

* * *

 _This is so fun,_ Kakashi thought from underneath his Henge. _I never got to do this when I was a Chunin._ Not that he couldn't be intimidating as a six-year-old, but coordinating multi-village events was difficult when they were all at war. "NUMBER 207! YOU FAIL!"

…Of course, the fact that this exam involved crazy homicidal maniacs and scheming enemy villages diminished his joy just a little bit.

But Kakashi pushed down the ugly thoughts and kept scanning the room. Things were going fine. His cute little students were doing well, as expected. All the other proctors, including the ANBU replacements, were none the wiser of his presence. (Which was good – he'd consider himself _seriously_ out of practice if he got caught.) And, statistically speaking, if what the Sandaime had told him about Danzo Shimura was true, then feigning ignorance was the optimal choice to take.

There was a good chance that they would make it through if he just let them be. On the other hand, throwing a wrench into the Hokage's (he hoped) well-crafted plans _now_ would pretty much ensure that everyone depending on it would die, his students included, if they got caught in the crossfire. With the way the world was quickly devolving into what could possibly be yet another war, he couldn't afford to behave irrationally right now.

He had half a mind to just toss his instructions to the wind and just fail them right then and there.

He seriously didn't care if he was allowed to stalk them for the entire duration of the test. Nor did he care that they really were skilled enough to stand up to all the other Genin. Letting them be used as pawns in some massive political scheme was just unbearable to him. It didn't matter how good the kids were; they were too young to get mixed up in this stuff. _All_ of them were too young to be involved in the schemes of the higher powers…

But what did he know about freedom? He had been enslaved to his work since the day he was born. Sakumo Hatake had been a kind man, but he hadn't had the slightest clue about how to raise a child all by himself. Kakashi had grown up around raw steel and training dummies, not board books and stuffed animals. The running joke among shinobi circles about letting babies teeth on kunai had been an occasional reality, in his case. (Speaking of which, Jiraiya probably still had some of those old pictures of him lying around – the first, last, and only photographs of him without his mask that hadn't had coffee "accidentally" spilled on them.)

It all came back to Konoha – an object of loyalty that they hadn't even been allowed to choose. For better or for worse, your friends were _all_ of the shinobi of Konoha, not just the ones you had emotional ties to. When Sakumo had abandoned his mission to save his teammates, he had neglected to consider the lives of his _other_ comrades also depending on him, then. Since it was impossible to save everybody, the next step should have been to save as many people as one possibly could. Cost-benefit analysis; maximization of parameters. Basic stuff.

Sakumo Hatake's mistake had been allowing emotion to cloud his judgment. He had chosen to save the three friends he could see instead of the hundreds he couldn't.

That was what the higher powers said.

But Kakashi knew better. His father's mistake hadn't been picking his team over the mission. His father's _real_ mistake had been judging such poor shinobi – and even poorer friends – to be worth the slight to his honor. For all of his talent at discerning lies, the man had been a horrible judge of character. Always too trusting of his supposed allies.

Kakashi didn't give a damn if he was being selfish. He'd choose the three kids he knew over the thousands of faceless masses any day, because unlike his father's teammates, they wouldn't be leaving him to join said faceless masses.

(If they did, they'd end up just like his father's teammates.)

(But they wouldn't, because they were smarter than that.)

A snort from beside him snapped him out of those depressing thoughts. He looked up; the Chunin-ANBU sitting next to him sarcastically pointed at a Konoha team that was rather obviously cheating – the girl had a makeup kit out and was clumsily using the tiny rounded mirror to draw the answers on her face. It might have worked, except Kakashi knew Tenten had never used makeup before in her life. But the method was interesting, unobtrusive, and not one hundred percent stupid (unlike that one guy that had tried folding his test into a paper airplane to throw across the room with), so they were forced to let her get away with it. Less obvious than the Byakugan or Sharingan, at least. Red irises positively glowed in dim light, as Kakashi only knew too well, having spent hours at a time staring at Obito's eye in his bathroom mirror.

Really, the only team that was doing "well" – as in, cheating at a level that wasn't so hilariously _Genin_ – was the team of one Kabuto Yakushi. The idiot who had gone out of his way to _make friends_ at a _Chunin exam_. Given the amount of times he had been through this thing, he should have realized by now that showing off to newbies was a bad idea in a place where everyone was out to cut each others' throats...

Strange that no one had noticed this before, but then again, they normally had Chunin, not ultra-paranoid ex-ANBU, proctoring this thing. Had circumstances not required him to actually physically be here this time around, he might have slipped under the radar like he always did every year.

 _Maybe I'm worrying too much. Maybe he really_ is _a ridiculously nice, noble, sympathetic,_ stupid _young little thing_ _who doesn't belong in the shinobi world and simply doesn't know it yet_ –

But then right at that moment, Kakashi made eye contact with Shikamaru, and he felt his arm freeze – _Kagemane no Jutsu._

Now his arm, under Shikamaru's control, was tracing a few doodles around his clipboard. To anyone else, it would only look like a bored Chunin trying to pass the time while proctoring a boring exam. But any ANBU worth their salt would know this code.

 _#-0-3-4_

 _C-L-A-S-S-I-F-I-E-D_

 _S-K-I-L-L_

 _R-E-P-O-R-T-S_

 _*end message_

Immediately, all of his former doubt flew away.

 _...That bastard. I almost felt sorry for him!_

This was bad.

This was very, very bad.

This was something _Ibiki_ deserved to know.

* * *

BONUS #6:

 _A Sneak Peek of Phase 2_

"Um, guys," Naruto asked, "does this place look familiar to you?"

Shikamaru and Ino stopped to take a look around.

"Oh, crap."

They all turned to each other and said at the same time,

 _"Tora."_

* * *

 **A/N: What would you name a nin-dog?**


	12. Into the Maze

BONUS #7

 _PSYCH, Foolish Mortals!_

A quick reminder of the OTHER places they've dealt with Tora _besides_ the Forest of Death:

"…Except for maybe kidnapping the Fire Daimyo's wife's cat and throwing it into a variety of terrains just to make them catch it (what better way to simulate a tracking mission in safe simulated conditions than with a pet that fought back?) – various training grounds, the woods, a random field of nothing but desert brush, a river crossing full of floating logs, a mountain cave system, a mazelike canyon, the red light district…"

-(Chapter 5)

* * *

 _The Chunin Exams, Phase 2_

It wasn't the Forest of Death, but it was pretty damn close. Of all the training grounds Kakashi-sensei had released Tora into, this one had been the worst to navigate. From the top, it really did look beautiful. A giant canyon millions of years in the making, it had been carved out by a network of tributaries running from the nearby mountains. The little rivers had long since dried up, but the maze-like arrangement of clay-streaked columns and tunnels that they had left behind were truly a sight to behold.

Of course, once you were actually down _in_ the canyon, it didn't look so pretty anymore.

The canyon seemed to have changed from the last time we had been there. For one, there were a lot more roadblocks than before. Obviously, the main rock walls would have to remain the same, but from what I could see, several more earth jutsu formations had oh-so-conveniently wedged themselves between the most efficient routes out of the canyon, and most likely not in a random manner. No doubt it was meant to purposely drive the teams toward each other so we would all end up fighting one another at some point in time.

Not only that, but there were also several wires strung across the walls here and there. I could barely see them; had it not been for the slight glint of the sun I doubted I would have noticed. As I looked more closely, however, I noticed all the walls were covered in them, as was the top of the maze. _Trip wires, then_. I had no idea what they were connected to, but it probably wasn't going to be good.

One thing was for sure – it would be unwise to attempt climbing over the top. There would be no easy way out here. After all, each phase of the Chunin exams were some sort of elimination round. It would be too easy if all everyone had to do was walk straight on through.

This whole thing was a godforsaken death trap. I wouldn't be surprised if the ground itself was laced with explosives and trapdoor spike pits. Now, theoretically, I still could have avoided everyone and everything by simply tunneling my way underneath the whole thing. Ground traps could only go so deep; after some point I'd be unreachable. The rockbed might cause a little more trouble than regular soil, but it wasn't impossible. A simple Headhunter jutsu, modified to allow air to come through so the user could remain hidden for an extended period of time, would have done the trick.

Unfortunately, I hadn't yet figured out how to accommodate passengers, meaning I wouldn't be able to bring Ino and Naruto – neither of whom were Earth jutsu users – along. At least there were plenty of shadows around, thanks to the steep, narrow walls.

"And where the heck are _your_ wristbands?" the proctor growled at the team in front of us.

One of the boys on the team fumbled for his. "I swear, I have it right here – no, wait, I swear! Just give me a second, I forgot to put mine on – I just put it in my bag, hold on – "

His teammates turned on him. "Don't tell me you _lost_ yours, you idiot!"

"ENOUGH!" the proctor snapped. "Stop wasting our time! Next!"

"Wait, I – "

But he never got to finish his sentence, because by then two of the assistant proctors had already grabbed him and his teammates by the arms. We could still hear him protesting loudly, even after they had already hurled him back out the gate. Naruto swallowed a gulp of fear, and it was completely understandable why. If the guys from the first exam weren't messing around, then the guys in this part were ten times as bad.

Only those with sufficient intelligent and strength would survive this thing and have a shot at becoming Chunin. The first exam was meant to weed out the stupid. This one was meant to weed out the weak.

"Right. Next. You lot. You look a bit small to be taking these exams, hm?"

Naruto wrinkled his nose a bit at the comment, but otherwise, he stayed under control, and we calmly showed him our wristbands.

"Huh," he said. "For a couple of rookie brats you seem unusually _grown-up_ compared to some of the other _big kids_ I've seen today."

We didn't rise to the bait. He rolled his eyes disappointedly, as if expecting us to throw a tantrum like a band of toddlers, but waved us past the registration bar to the "antechamber" of the canyon all the same. From there, our team surreptitiously tried to navigate to the edge of the crowd of waiting examinees, where we would be less likely to be noticed, trampled, or pickpocketed. In the end we were relegated to one of the corners, which wasn't as bad as it sounded, because now we only had to watch out on two sides and not four. Not to mention, corners were a good vantage point of observation when in large crowds.

Once the last few teams had finished registering for the second phase, Moto-san began the instructions lecture. In direct contrast to the proctor from the first exam, he made a point of speaking as quietly as possible. His voice was barely above whisper.

Which was massively unhelpful, seeing as we were standing _outdoors_ in a very _windy_ area that was completely _filled_ with echo-causing geologic formations.

These people, I swear. They just lived to make the rest of our lives difficult. And they were doing a very fine job of it, too, because it was actually _working_. It was obvious he was doing it on purpose, just to troll the rest of us. Making people nervous. Wondering, perhaps, if we had heard that last bit right. We were about to go into this nerve-wracking multi-day survival warzone, and he couldn't even be bothered to say the instructions clearly. He didn't care about any of us, and he was letting it show. Amazing, how something as simple as giving instructions in the wrong volume for a situation could ruin someone's day.

"Right. Listen up, infants, because I'm not speaking any louder than I have to," said Moto-san. "Your job is to find your way through this canyon maze thing to that amazing tower _all the way up there_."

He pointed.

We looked.

"Well?" he goaded. "Pretty slick, huh?"

Mumbles.

"I can't hear you!" he whispered again. (What a hypocrite.)

Unimpressed silence.

"Hey, say something, all right?" he said. "Is that not the greatest damn tower in the history of the world or what?"

Some unwise loudmouth in the front of the crowd raised his hand. "I just see a really decrepit one-story wooden shack with a cardboard sign saying 'this is the tower' taped to it – "

Moto-san surreptitiously smacked him into silence. "Shut up! We were _supposed_ to have an actual tower in the Forest of Death, all right? But because of certain complications that are none of your beeswax, we had to move the test out here, and this place never had any towers, so that ranger station is the next best thing you can get, okay? Okay. Sheesh. Ungrateful bratheads."

A girl from the team next to us snorted out loud, and immediately all of the proctors' eyes swiveled on to her.

"Sorry," she tried, instead of taking the more mature route and shutting up like she was supposed to, "it's just – I've never heard the phrase 'brathead' before – I mean, I've heard 'brat' and 'dickhead' but not 'brathead' and – "

Needless to say, her big rambling mouth got her team kicked out in less than half a second. It seemed that the proctors expected us all to have infinite sense of hearing and zero sense of humor, just like them.

I couldn't help but wonder what those special little complications were (though I had a pretty good idea by now with all those hints Kakashi-sensei had been dropping earlier), even though I knew I was supposed to be focusing on this exam right now.

"Like I said, before we were so _rudely_ interrupted, you have to get to that tower _all the way up there_ in…eh, we'll make it three days. That's how long people can last without water, right? Whatever. Don't care. Just make sure you get up there with all three team members alive. Because you might have a bit of difficulty finding a river in this thing."

Water. Thank goodness we had enough hydration pills for the whole week, because Moto-san's last sentence had been a lie. A "bit" of difficulty. Hah. That canyon hadn't had a single drop of running water in it for the past few thousand years. All of its water came from our rainy season, which had ended months ago.

Suddenly, I felt _really_ sorry for the people who had only brought one canteen along and were banking on finding a river somewhere in here.

Moto-san seemed to know this, too, because he was smiling like a cat that had gotten both the cream and the canary at the horrified faces of the unprepared Genin.

"Oh, and you know those cute little wristbands you got at the end of the first phase? Hold on to them, because if any one team member loses theirs, the whole team gets physically ejected from the maze via reverse summoning seal. Unless you want to give up or something – say, one of your team members is about to die, then you should probably take it off, because if you get to the tower with a dead teammate, you don't get to pass anyway. By the way, _hint hint_ , if there's any team that you _want_ to get kicked out before the third round, that's a good way to get them kicked out, _hint hint_."

There was some nervous shuffling as the various Genin glanced around at each other, trying to size up their competition. I, for one, was simply glad that Naruto was no longer traffic-cone orange, otherwise we'd be under an unnecessary about of scrutiny. More than was due.

Moto-san clapped his hands. " _Aaaand_ that's it! My final words? Um…have fun, stay safe, and don't mess up. I sure enjoyed myself designing this thing, and I'll be really disappointed if you guys don't enjoy yourselves solving it," he said, his sharp teeth spread in a dissonantly cheerful shark smile. "Everyone good? Then, ready, set, go!"

The crowd of Genin exploded out into the rock walls, and immediately afterwards, there were screams coming from all directions.

Those who had been "lucky" enough to get a spot by the front were now human shields for everyone coming after them instead – against the maze, against the traps, against the other teams coming up behind and around them.

It was chaos. The one entrance into the canyon was completely bottlenecking all the test-takers. People were getting trampled left and right. I could see Choji's giant frame edging everyone else out of the way; in two steps he was gone, Hinata and Sasuke along with him, riding on his back (I was randomly reminded of those children's cartoon characters with the devil and angel on each shoulder). Meanwhile, Lee, Neji, and Tenten were literally picking people up and throwing, kicking, punching, or stabbing them out of their way as they went along.

Then, more screaming, this time about bugs; several people were wandering off in the wrong direction as if drunk and lost. Genjutsu. And kikaichu. There went Team 8. The genjutsu was probably Sakura; she'd have the chakra control and aptitude for it. If only we knew something advanced enough to steer someone else in the wrong direction. Whoever wasn't fortunate enough to get out of their way in time was immediately swarmed by Shino's bugs.

They weren't the only ones. As soon as the people in the middle and back realized they weren't going anywhere without forcing someone else out of the way first, they began to fight their way through. Blood was running freely, and most of the competitors hadn't even entered the actual exam yet.

"What are we going to do?" Naruto moaned, ducking a kunai.

"It's okay; I have a plan," I said.

"When do you _not_?" Ino smiled. "All right; what is it?"

I grinned. "How fast can you do a Kawarimi?"

About three substitutions later, we were at the front of the group, cackling like mad and running for our lives while the people we had used as our placeholders were left standing back in the corner, wondering what the hell had just happened. By the time they had figured it out, the three of us were already gone, too far out of range for anyone to attempt the same thing on us.

My lungs were on fire, but I wouldn't have it any other way. To watch a well-crafted plan execute perfectly was amazing, yes. But to see the same exact thing occur with a plan so _stupidly simple_ …there was no way I could describe it. The adrenaline rush coming from tricking a large group of people with pure, unadultered idiocy was a feeling that could not be replicated by anything else. A smug _it's working, just as I expected_ simply could not compare to a half-giddy, half-triumphant _god, this is so dumb; I can't believe it's working!_

Suddenly I understood Kakashi-sensei's sense of "humor" just a little bit more.

And gods, it was _great_.

But even though we were doing well _now_ , we couldn't afford to grow complacent. The memory of all the people bleeding in the traps near the entrance sobered me up quite quickly, and we were soon forced to come up with a plan for our own survival. Unlike Team 8, none of us had tracker animals to scout out the terrain for us beforehand, and unlike Teams 9 and 10, we didn't have special eyes to see ahead, either.

We did have ninjutsu, and Naruto's clones, though. So there was that.

It took us a moment to coordinate ourselves, but soon we had our trap-detecting abilities down to a science. I could use earth jutsu to shift underground rocks with each step, and use that to detect if there were any pit traps before us. Ino would be on the lookout for genjutsu and aboveground wires. And Naruto's clones would be in the front, as a final mode of defense. If any one of them dispersed, we'd know where not to step.

For the first part of the maze, we managed to avoid all the other teams, which was mostly a good thing. I say "mostly" because the maze itself was more dangerous than the Genin running around in it, as we soon discovered (luckily not the hard way – Kakashi-sensei had done that to us one too many times for us to make the same mistakes here now).

The examiners had truly gone all-out on this thing. Any patch of earth could be the entrance to a pit of spikes. A convenient-looking opening in the rocks was definitely laced with trip wires to snares and kunai launchers. Most of the traps were well-hidden, and the ones that weren't only served to trick the impatient into letting their guards down.

We had been here before, so we mostly knew our way around, but even so, we had to progress slowly and carefully, with a bunch of Naruto clones ahead of us at all times. He had the energy to fill up the whole maze with clones, actually, but I didn't want any Naruto clones to accidentally run into an enemy team. And when he had tried to simply summon a clone so that it appeared at the top of the maze, one of the Chunin proctors had immediately kicked it off.

But if the sole challenge of the maze was avoiding traps, it wouldn't be much of a Chunin exam.

We met our first opposition a few hours in. Or rather, they met us. It wasn't much of a fight, because while they had been distracted by a Naruto clone, we had come up in their blind spot. From there, yanking off a wristband didn't take more than a few seconds in a Shadow Clutch. We disposed of two or three more teams in this same manner, each met in a shorter interval of time than the first.

Our first "real" fight had been a Kumo team with a very unfortunate naming scheme. I knew that it was tradition for Kumo nin to name people after letters of the alphabet. What I didn't realize was that Kumo nin also had a very ironic sense of humor. At least, the Kumo chunin in charge of team formation, anyway.

They insisted upon calling themselves "Team For the Win", but, come on. With the letters W, T, and F on the same team, did they really expect people to go with that?

Well, that didn't matter. Team FTW-WTF was slightly older than us. Only by a few years. Which didn't seem like much…unless those years were separating pre- and post-growth spurt. In any event, F had been a stealth expert, one of the few genjutsu users in existence to have mastered full invisibility, and she was the one who gave us the most trouble out of the three of them. But the wristbands were linked between team members – so when Ino had managed to take out W, all of them disappeared.

As we kept going deeper into the maze, the frequency of people attacking us got higher and higher. Which was _weird_ , because even _if_ the pathways were deliberately driving us towards other people, our meetings shouldn't have been _this_ frequent. Unless my calculations were off. Which I was _sure_ they weren't. And that bothered me, because for some reason I felt bored and itching for a fight, even when there was no fight to be had, even when _logically_ I knew the most optimal strategy was to _avoid_ all the fights we could, and only take advantage of a sneak-attack if the opportunity presented itself.

That was when I noticed that something was wrong. For one, the rock walls were starting to seem slightly off. Just _slightly_. But enough to get me on high alert. I remembered the exact layout of this place, and I _knew_ – completely shifting the foundations Mother Nature had set all for a bunch of measly Genin were not in the examiners' best interest.

Adding walls and setting more traps – that was understandable. But changing the face of the rock canyon itself was too time-consuming and inefficient.

"Naruto, are you okay?" Ino asked. "You look a bit green."

"I…don't know," Naruto muttered, pushing Ino away. Ino slapped his arm. Naruto slapped her back. Ino curled her fingers into a fist.

This wasn't right. Naruto was loud and boisterous. But he was never deliberately rude or hurtful. I surreptitiously drew a weapon, and hid it behind my back. "What was the code they gave us during the first phase?"

"Do I look like I remember?" Naruto snapped. "You guys were the ones who solved it. Ino had to knock me out to get the answers to me!"

I felt angry for no reason, like I couldn't trust Naruto. I didn't feel like trusting Ino, either. I hated both of them. Which was very strange, because there was no reason why I should be –

"Drugs," I whispered.

"What?" Naruto asked.

"Guys, we have to stay calm. We're running on borrowed time here."

Naruto narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean?"

"I think – I think they've released mind-altering gases into this maze," I explained. "Colorless and odorless, but – it's a delayed-effect sort of thing. Induces paranoia and aggression. I remember reading about something like this once. Rarely used in combat, because it's hard to control, notoriously unpredictable, and could easily affect your teammates in the same vicinity as your enemies. But when you're applying it from the top of a canyon – where you have fresh air – on a bunch of Genin who you want to mess with but not kill…"

"…Brilliantly evil," Ino said, calming down. "Most teams won't be smart enough to realize they're being messed with, _especially_ if they regularly argue with their teammates anyway. They'll just continue to get more irrational and disoriented, until they finally turn on _each other_. Or, if they're close to another team, they'll have the urge to fight anyway, even if combat isn't in their best interest. Either way, they'll be their own reason why they won't get out of here in time."

Naruto scratched his head. "Is there an antidote?"

I shrugged. "There probably is, but we don't have it. It's so rarely used anyway – I think Sand tried it, like, once two wars ago, and it was a bust, so they never tried it again – that I doubt it's distributed commercially. Which is why they're using it here. Few people would be able to get an unfair advantage when faced with something like this, even if they have poison experts on their team. It's not enough that they test our ability to remain calm even when the situation is bad – they have to test our ability to remain calm when our brains are being _physically and chemically told otherwise_."

"So what do we do now?"

"Well, now that we're _aware_ of the fact, we can control ourselves more consciously. And cover our noses and mouths. I don't know if that will help, but if we convince ourselves that it's working we might be able to psychologically trick ourselves into thinking that we're no longer being affected by this gas. Meanwhile, Naruto, see if you can get us a column of fresh air. I don't know how long the effects last, but the sooner we get rid of the source the better."

"We look like Kakashi-sensei," Ino said.

I laughed. "Maybe that's why – "

I was cut off with a scream.

"That sounded like Hinata and Choji," Ino said. "And Sasuke!"

This was bad. Kakashi-sensei may have told us not to trust anyone else in the exams, but Choji was my friend. If he was in trouble, I couldn't just _leave_ him. Ino, naturally, would drag the rest of us along regardless when it came to Sasuke. And you'd have to be a douchebag of major proportions to leave a girl like Hinata to die.

But then again, maybe they were just being affected by the gas, and it was no big deal. Maybe it was just some other trick of the examiners, to test and see if we were stupid enough to go running into an obvious trap disguised as comrades in trouble –

There was a loud hiss and a pop, and Naruto started. "One of my clones just dispersed. Team 10 is right up ahead. Some giant snake is attacking them."

…and, I guess not.

"Giant snake? Like how giant?" Ino asked worriedly.

"As in summon-size big," Naruto said. "Like ten boa constrictors. Big enough to swallow one of us whole. The tip of the tail was the size of my leg, and it smacked my clone in the side."

"Summon-size?" I asked. "There's no way any normal Genin could do that! The only person currently capable of summoning one of the _giant_ snakes is…holy shit…"

"Orochimaru," Ino finished. "What the heck is a _Sannin_ doing in the Chunin exams?"

"I don't know…" I whispered, my mind racing. "I know there were suspicions that Sand was planning something, but Orochimaru…"

"Shikamaru?" Naruto asked.

Orochimaru was a missing-nin of Konoha; he could be back here for any reason. The question was, if he and Sand were actively working together, or if he had known of the Sand attack and was using it as a distraction for his own agenda, or if both he and Sand knew about each other and were working together…So many possibilities. And yet, Team Asuma had been the first to run into them. The team with Sasuke Uchiha. This was no coincidence.

"Ino – send up three red flares – get some adults over here."

" _Three?_ " Ino asked, shocked. I could understand why. One flare by itself was the ultimate code for an emergency.

I nodded. "Yes. Three."

The bright red beams arced into the air, highly visible against the slowly darkening sky. "This is really bad, isn't it?" Naruto asked.

"Which is why we used those flares," I said.

Ino shook her head. "But we can't just stand and _wait_ here, either. What if it takes too long for the proctors to arrive? We _have_ to help them!"

"We can't just run in there blindly; we need a plan!" I told her. "Listen, Choji is my friend, too, but if we _all_ die that's not going to make things any better, is it?"

"Why isn't anyone coming?" Naruto asked.

Suddenly, my legs felt like they had been frozen to the ground. There was a giant elephant sitting on my chest. I couldn't breathe. My hands started to shake, and my vision was blacking out around the edges. Before my eyes, my mind began showing me future visions of my own death over and over and over again…

"Killer Intent," I gasped. "That's why."

Then I went under.


	13. Serpent Strike

**A/N: _[Italicized speech in brackets]_ is being heard over an electronic medium (TV, radio, etc).**

* * *

 _The Chunin Exams, Phase 2_

 _Base 9, Observation_

Ibiki Morino narrowed his eyes at the TV screen as he watched the team of Kabuto Yakushi _–_ the same guys that were supposed to have failed the Chunin exams six times before _–_ figure out the trick almost immediately.

 _[Kabuto, you idiot, you KNOW he won't be pleased if you – ]_

 _[Shut up; shut up now!]_

 _[You're just saying that because you know I'm right! Oro – ]_

 _[WE'RE BEING DRUGGED, you IDIOT! SHUT UP!]_

And then, Ibiki watched in wonder as Kabuto began mixing chemicals faster than a blink of an eye, with skill that was normally reserved only for the greatest medics on par with Tsunade. In the matter of a few seconds, he had shoved cloths soaked with the antidote to the drug to the faces of his teammates, effectively cutting them off from revealing any more information in their artificial anger.

 _What the hell?_ Ibiki thought. They had deliberately chosen that drug because it was unlikely that anyone would even recognize its existence, let alone know enough of its properties to figure out an antidote for it. And that quickly, too. Either this guy was just that smart, or…

 _The drug originated from Sunagakure. What if he knows how to deal with it because…?_

Something was terribly wrong. Especially since this Kabuto Yakushi individual _definitely_ had the skills to pass. Maybe it was bad luck – but bad luck alone couldn't account for all that, otherwise Tsunade of the Sannin would have never graduated the Academy.

So if it wasn't a lack of skill, and if it wasn't a lack of luck, then what was it?

 _Kabuto Yakushi, the eternal Genin, secretly a Jonin-level spy!_ Ibiki laughed ruefully to himself. _Hah!_ He would have spat in the face of anyone who brought him such a ridiculous conspiracy theory – would have, had it been anyone but Hatake.

 _Of course only_ he _could be right about a theory as crazy as this,_ Ibiki thought. This particular chemical hadn't just been chosen for laughs (although it _was_ fun, watching the Genin go crazy). When teammates started turning on each other, they were very likely to reveal very sensitive information about themselves. As Kabuto's team had almost done, before they were cut off.

He scratched at his ANBU mask through his Henge. This specific double layer of disguise had been temporarily agreed on as standard protocol for this particular defensive strike. All of the ANBU were masked in this way – first, in the regular high-quality bone-white armor that only the village's most "elite" forces could afford to use, and then, the identity of another Chunin examiner on top of that.

They couldn't afford to let knowledge of their suspicions of the Sand invasion out, and obviously highly visible squads of upper level assassins patrolling what should have been a standard Chunin exam, albeit a rather crowded one, would blow that cover. Before he had been the head of ANBU Torture and Interrogation, when he had just been a new, green recruit, and the previous head, Mikado Yuuhi, had still been in charge, he'd spend hours and hours going over their one philosophy of war: _Half of victory is what you know, and the other half is what the enemy doesn't._

In any event, operations of this magnitude weren't cleared for knowledge by the general forces anyway. Not that he didn't trust his fellow shinobi, but many Jonin could be notoriously loose-lipped after a couple of drinks. The Sand – and their little ally – were not allowed to even catch wind of the vaguest rumor that Konoha was even the slightest bit prepared for their scheme.

"Sir," ANBU Owl, to his left, pointed down at the sparring Genin. "Is that supposed to be some sort of kekkei genkai? Because I've never seen it before."

Ibiki turned away from Kabuto Yakushi for just a few seconds to stare at his also purple-clad (tacky, much?) teammate. Said teammate was using his limbs to coil and twist around his opponent like some sort of demented rubber puppet. And no, Ibiki had never seen anything like it before, and he had seen plenty of highly disturbing things during his long tenure as head of ANBU Torture and Interrogation. Even if he hadn't, the fact that this guy's body was doing things way beyond the natural realm of chakra was enough of a warning bell. Genin did not just invent entirely new ways of fighting all on their own, least of all Genin who failed Chunin exams six whole times in a row.

"No," he answered his subordinate, "those aren't kekkei genkai. They're body modifications."

His radio crackled to life. _[Sir,]_ squad Salamander-alpha echoed over the line, _[Report of body modifications on the Sound team confirmed. I repeat, report of body modifications on the Sound team confirmed.]_

"Copy that," Ibiki barked in reply.

 _[One of them has pipes built into his arms. Not even air ninjutsu – just a couple of metal pipes literally sticking out of his palms.]_

"That's two of them we've got to watch, then," Ibiki muttered angrily to himself. "What are their estimated skill reports?"

 _[They seem to be regular Genin in terms of both skill and intelligence, sir. All of them are in their mid-teens, maybe fourteen, fifteen years old. And unless they're purposely using subterfuge tactics to throw us off, their maturity is at about the expected level – maybe a bit on the lower end,]_ the speaker from squad Salamander-Alpha replied. _[The only unusual things seen so far are the pipes built into one of the boys, and the sound-based jutsu of the other boy.]_

"Continue."

 _[We are not sure how they came to be there. The pipes are definitely a nasty work of surgery. As for the other boy, it could just be a special jutsu. No confirmation on him yet.]_

"And their third member?"

 _[Standard sound-based genjutsu. She's the most normal one out of the three.]_

"Any interesting conversations?"

 _[They have a "master", it appears. They were arguing about him earlier, when the drug was released into the maze. No explicit reference to who that "master" is, yet. Strange way to refer to a Jonin sensei, if that's what they're talking about.]_

"Copy. Over and out," Ibiki said shortly, tucking the radio set back into his belt. "Now those are some very interesting news. Some _very_ interesting news indeed. Blackhawk!"

"Orders, sir?"

"Continue to keep careful watch over Team Kabuto. We'll have a wonderful little welcome party hosted by ANBU Torture and Interrogation waiting for them at their exit."

"What about that other team, sir?"

Ibiki smiled grimly. These were teenagers they were dealing with – probably just unwitting pawns, just like the original Chunin examiners currently knocked out and in bed that his ANBU squad had replaced. But orders were orders, and right now, their mission was to keep the village safe. And if that meant leaving no stone unturned, whether it was a team of potential spies or a couple of stupid kids playing ninja who happened to get caught up with the wrong crowd, then so be it.

And thus, Ibiki gave his final command. "Oh, they're invited, too. We want to play nice and be polite hosts so no one gets their feelings hurt, don't we?"

Contrary to popular belief, he _did_ have a heart. It was just…all ugly and shriveled up.

"Wait," ANBU Gopher raised her hand – she was the youngest one on the team, a newly minted Jonin from one of the Hyuga branch families. "We're supposed to play dumb and keep quiet, right? How do we do that if we capture them? Won't they know that the ANBU are watching them then, if a few of their spies suddenly go missing?"

"But we're not ANBU," Ibiki told her innocently. "We're just your average Chunin examiners, and we're just rewarding them for a job well done by giving them the best rooms in the suite while they wait for everyone else to finish – "

"Sir, we have another problem."

Ibiki turned away from Gopher and leveled a glare at the sealing squad member that had interrupted him. "What?"

"The tracking seals on the wristbands for all the Genin – they're no longer working. Someone just disabled them."

Then the radio crackled to life once more.

 _[Black alert! I repeat, black alert!]_

Ibiki dropped everything and swore at the top of his lungs.

* * *

 _Shit,_ Kakashi thought as soon as he saw the snake summon. _We expected Sunagakure to cause trouble. Not – whatever the hell this is. Please tell me it's not going to be – oh, who am I kidding; of course I know who the hell this is. Freaking Orochimaru, that's who, because Anko is the only other person I know with snake summons and she hasn't figured out how to get the giant snakes on her side yet and why, oh why, is this happening?_

If the giant serpent hadn't popped out of the ground right then and there, Kakashi was pretty sure that the Sannin might have gone through this entire thing unnoticed. Not long after, the ANBU that had been assigned to survey this area of the maze fell to the ground, his head detached from his shoulders. And then his two partners – damn. Gone, too.

They had put up a good fight, but Orochimaru was more than just ANBU. He had been one of Konoha's best and brightest. Compared to these guys – well, he didn't know them personally, but they seemed young, barely newbies. Skilled ANBU wouldn't be all the way out here in this maze, observing Genin; they'd be in the city center of Konoha, defending the main sectors or out on money-making missions. Kakashi was the only "veteran" here apart from Ibiki, but Ibiki was an interrogator, not a frontline fighter.

 _Damn, I hate this armor. It brings up bad memories._

But at least wearing this set (which had been borrowed without permission from someone else) was better than wearing his own. With this one, he could make the excuse that he wasn't _actually_ back in ANBU; it was just another disguise (albeit a highly uncomfortable one) temporarily donned for the sole purpose of following his Genin through these exams. His own ANBU uniform was safely tucked away in a cardboard box in his attic, and that one he had sworn to never touch again.

 _Never ever not in a thousand million billion years_ …but hey, what were his promises even worth? He was Kakashi Hatake, a shinobi, a conman, a trickster, a well-known liar. The mouths of men were just two flaps of skin, so it would be stupid to believe anything sounds that came out of them – _his_ mouth least of all.

You'd think sabotage by the Hidden Sand would be bad enough. But oh, no, _someone_ had to go and invite Orochimaru to join the party, too. Orochimaru, Konoha's most dangerous missing-nin in forever (until Itachi Uchiha, but that was a completely different story), and just – _oh, gods_. And speaking of the gods, those bastards just _loved_ to make his life miserable, didn't they? It was almost like the heavens were getting _revenge_ on him for – for something.

He had no idea what he, a completely innocent ninja (hah!) had done to justify this sort of retribution. It wasn't as if _he_ lived to make other people miserable on a daily basis now, did he?

(Oh, wait.)

And to top it all off, _his_ team was also in the vicinity. Because, dumb luck, or whatever…but the point was, they hadn't _left_ even though common sense dictated otherwise…Of _course_ they'd run over to help their friends.

 _You should have known better, Hatake,_ Kakashi thought to himself. _You've been spouting off Obito's ideologies since the day you met. If they die here…NO. I can't let them die here. But what if they – no, no, no, Hatake, you get a grip right now and get the kids out of this mess before they get here and make things even worse!_

"Black alert! I repeat, black alert!"he snapped over the radio as he started to seal off the area. He was no master, but that didn't mean he wasn't highly capable. Being a student of the late Yondaime had some of its perks, and one of them was learning sealing from only the best. You just didn't walk away from such tutelage without at least picking up _something_ about sealing. "All capable ANBU teams report to the area immediately. I have quarantined the area."

 _[Copy. Seal system disabled. We're summoning backup now. Do your best.]_

Kakashi sucked in a breath. _Crap. Should have expected it, from a guy like Orochimaru._

They'd been too smart for their own good, bringing the children outside of the city walls like this. Sure, they'd be far away from harm if Sand decided to try anything funny against Konoha itself, but now that Orochimaru was in the equation, it meant whatever help wasn't already here would take a long time to arrive. The canyon was miles away from home base; it would take a few minutes for even the fastest shinobi, running at a sprint, to get here.

Orochimaru only needed much less than that to end them all.

Sasuke Uchiha was still curled up at the foot of the rock wall, paralyzed by the man's massive Killer Intent. Even Kakashi, all these years later, still had trouble standing up to it, let alone a little Genin, no matter how skilled the Academy teachers claimed he was. He grabbed the boy by the back of his shirt, the massive collar providing a convenient grip, and a good hard toss landed him nice and far away from the range of fire. Thankfully, another ANBU was already there, waiting to receive the boy.

One less life for him to worry about.

"…My, _my_ ," Orochimaru hissed behind him, his voice still as sickly sweet as ever. "And what have we _here_?"

 _One less life, and one more death._

* * *

 _Logic,_ I chastised myself. _It's just Killer Intent. You're not actually_ dying _. Pull yourself together, Shikamaru!_ Beside me, Ino and Naruto were also gasping. I tried to reach out to them, but the oppressive fear just kept dragging me down –

"DAMMIT!" Naruto suddenly roared. "I'M NARUTO UZUMAKI! I'M GONNA BE HOKAGE ONE DAY! AND I'M NOT LETTING THIS STUPID WHATEVER IT IS HOLD ME DOWN!"

And then the fear broke, and suddenly I was back in my right mind again.

"Thanks, Naruto," Ino gasped. She looked around. "Where is everyone? I sent up the flares!"

"I don't know," I said. There was an explosion, and another scream.

"We have to go help," Ino said. "I don't know where the heck everyone is, but if we just sit here and wait for someone else to fix things, they might die before the others come. We have to take matters into our own hands; there's no other way."

"Fine," I said. Ino did have a point; the people in charge of this event most likely already knew that something was wrong, even without our flares. It would be hard to miss giant snakes popping up out of nowhere. I only hoped that the same people were smart enough to turn off the drugged gas, too, because now that the field was actually a combat zone it wouldn't do to have stuff that could potentially hurt your own side floating around in the air. "But we need a plan to minimize damage, otherwise we'll just be making things worse."

"Of course," said Ino.

"Right. Naruto, go in there with some clones and distract the snake – Ino, aim some fire jutsu at its eyes to blind it – and I'll try my best to hold it down. If that doesn't work, then Naruto, I want you to jump on it with as many clones as you possibly can to try and squish it. All right?"

"Got it," they said, and we rushed around the corner.

 _NOW!_ I signaled, and a cloud of clones exploded out from Naruto.

"Naruto-kun!"

"Hey, Hinata! Don't worry about me! Where's Choji?"

The snake reared in pain as Ino managed to get a perfect shot in. Right after, I latched onto it with my shadow, and at the same time sucked it into a sinkhole. As soon as it was trapped, I began crushing it under the tons of mud, tar, and rock, starting from the tail. The snake's hissing turned into screams, for it was stuck; I made sure of that when the exact patch of ground I had chosen to trap it in was one laced with collapsing nail pits.

"The s-snake a-ate him!" Hinata stuttered, pointing at the massive bulge on the snake's throat. I noticed she had no wristband on. The strip of plastic was lying on the ground, a few feet away. So they had already tried the surrender mode. Evidently, the reverse-summoning seals that had been used to transport all those other teams out of the maze were no longer working. That meant we were being kept here deliberately.

"Help!" Choji's voice echoed. He was using the Multi-Size jutsu to prevent the snake from swallowing him completely, but it wasn't very effective. Snakes could swallow prey much bigger than they were, and all Choji was doing was forcing it to stretch itself out a bit wider. I began to compact the earth even more, in an attempt to cut off its digestive tract.

"Choji!" Hinata whispered. Suddenly, a look of determination came over her, and, before I could even think, she had charged straight at the frozen summon and punched it as hard as she could in the throat.

Which was pretty hard. Hinata may not have looked like much, but she was still the heiress to the Hyuga clan. She had been learning taijutsu since she could walk. And while her confidence levels were abysmally low, I had seen her do some pretty awesome stuff when necessity called. Desperation made a good teacher in certain situations, and now was one of them. All I could say was, I was glad Hinata managed to call on her strengths when she did, because it saved Choji's life, and that was points in my book.

The snake made an ugly choking noise, and a second later, it had vomited up Choji, who was now flying through the air toward the opposite wall.

"Everyone duck and cover!" Choji yelled.

There was another explosion, only this time, it came from inside the snake's throat. For a second, I thought that someone had managed to find a species of fire-breathing snake somehow, until I realized that the snake itself was actually burning up from the inside.

"You detonated a tag inside of its mouth," I realized. "That's brilliant!"

And now that Choji was no longer in there, I could crush the summon as well as I pleased. Snakes might have been creatures of the earth, but even they couldn't survive a cave-in. Layering rock over it, so we would be protected from the worst of the explosion, I allowed the snake to die, buried under a cloud of smoke and gravel. The summon screeched one last time, and then dispersed back to its own dimension.

"Sasuke's still in trouble, though," Choji said quickly, wiping the slime off his clothes. "We got separated from him. There was this – this guy – and he was way stronger than all of us. He stole Sasuke's tag, but we weren't kicked out of the maze for some reason – I don't know; he was just a really, _really_ creepy guy. I don't know how he got here – he literally just popped out of the ground like a gopher!…"

I closed my eyes and forced myself to calm down. _Judge the current scenario. Set your goals and priorities. Use that to form your plan of action._ One thing was clear – our job here, was no longer passing a stupid test, not when we were all a mere corridor away from death.

To survive. That was all we could do at this point.

 _Which begs the question, just what else is going on that we Genin don't know about, but might be affected by anyway?_

"We still have to help Sasuke-kun," Ino reminded us.

"My clone just found _three_ dead ANBU up there," Naruto told us.

"What?" I gasped. "What about – the others?"

"Still fighting, but they won't be for long," Naruto said. "Sasuke's still alive, but he's not moving. Either he got knocked out or the KI is still pinning him in place."

Just then, one of the ANBU appeared at the top of the wall. "You kids – get out of here!"

"Our friend's still back there!" Choji yelled.

"We've got him! You guys have to leave! Now!" the ANBU ordered, quickly herding us out of the way. Sure enough, her partner appeared behind us, carrying an unconscious Sasuke on his back. "The sealing network is down; everyone must evacuate immediately!"

As we weren't suicidal enough to sit around arguing pointlessly, we obeyed and started running in the opposite direction. Not a moment too soon, either, for the moment she finished given the order another flare of angry chakra exploded out from behind the walls. The corridors collapsed, demolished by Orochimaru's sheer power, and then there was nothing standing between us and death except for a stretch of air and a thin wall of mortal men.

* * *

"Itty bitty ANBU-san," Orochimaru crooned. "You thought you could hide from _me_?"

"We'll hold him off!"Kakashi barked a final command into the radio as Orochimaru advanced on him. Figures. He couldn't remain hidden from that man for long. The guise was up.

Orochimaru gasped mockingly. "What's this? You'll _hold me off_? Little bitty ANBU-kun…you all look _so_ adorable in your _matching outfits._ "

Kakashi showed no emotion except for an increase in the bravado – not that laying it on thick would fool the Sannin anyway – and defiantly stomped one last time in the ground, closing the box seal. Realizing he was trapped, Orochimaru hissed in anger and tried to break past the line of calligraphy with a flare of energy so that he could access his human prize, only to be impeded by an invisible wall of chakra instead.

"Oh, I see," the man chuckled. Except, that wasn't quite completely accurate, because if the rumors about what he had done to himself were true (and they probably were, because he only dealt with Konoha ANBU Intelligence, the _most_ valuable and accurate gossip mongerers around) then he was not quite a man any longer. "A seal to prevent movement of both physical bodies _and_ chakra. But I suppose that's to be expected from you, Kakashi Hatake…although, didn't you have a different mask? Anyway, I thought you quit."

Orochimaru knew who he was. Great. He could sense the confusion rising from the other ANBU. As they should, because he technically shouldn't even be here.

What was the point of using the wrong mask if you weren't going to get any anonymity from it either way?

"…I'm impressed, Kakashi-kun. Truly, I am. Fuinjutsu is a very difficult art to master, you know. Especially learning by yourself, without a _living_ teacher to train you. It's not as if being forever alone should bother you, because you're already used to dead teammates, aren't you?"

Kakashi refused to rise to the bait. Only the Sandaime and sometimes Jiraiya were allowed to talk down to him like that. The Sandaime, because orders were orders (unless they didn't really suit him, naturally), and Jiraiya, because he was willing to put up with _some_ verbal abuse if it meant that he could continue to get free advance copies of the _Icha Icha_ series.

"Unfortunately, you forgot one little thing, my little Kakashi-kun. Whenever I'm trapped in here with _you_ , it also means that _you're_ also stuck in here with _me_. Doesn't it?"

The voices of the Genin – _his_ Genin, _his_ team, _his_ family were getting closer. (Wait, no, take that back; he didn't _have_ a family, he didn't _have_ loved ones, because they were all just going to get killed like all the others, and oh, who was he kidding – he was so, completely screwed. Those damn kids had screwed him over, had screwed _themselves_ over by worming their way into his heart, and now they'd pay the price for it.)

(No, no, no, that's not right, either. _Focus, Hatake, and stop panicking; there's nothing you can do but face the problem right in front of you and solve it. Now. Or else._ )

(Please. Please, please, please please _please_.)

And while Kakashi would have liked nothing better than to turn tail and _get the hell out of there_ , that would have meant leaving his students – plus Asuma's team, too – to the mercies of this monster with the face of a man (only that was an insult to monsters, was it not?). So, instead, he stood his ground and shifted his own position so that he became another barrier between Orochimaru and Team 7.

(And please please _please_ don't let this one turn out like the _other_ Team 7.)

(Please.)

"Well?" Orochimaru hissed, slithering closer. "You're in my way now, you know. Oh, but you already know that, don't you? You're Kakashi Hatake, the little five-year-old prodigy; of _course_ you're _always_ aware of what you're doing, even when you act otherwise. Think wisely, little one. Is this really your choice?"

 _Shut up; you're even more annoying than I am,_ Kakashi thought, digging his feet into the ground. On the outside, he remained silent and impassive, behind his brick wall of emotionless masks.

"Well then. A fight it is. Death is what you want, and so it is death that you shall have. Shall I give you a moment to figure out what to say when you finally get your family reunion with your beloved father?"

Kakashi responded in the usual way for irritatingly talkative enemies, and gathered lightning in his palm.


	14. Dead or Alive

**A/N: Before you read this chapter, you should go back and read Chapter 9. Unless you're a rebel. Then ignore me.**

* * *

 _The Second Phase_

Orochimaru let out a loud bark of sarcastic laughter. _God_ , the Raikiri was _boring as hell_. You'd think, given Hatake's normal mentality, that he'd be a little more creative.

"Oh? What's this?" Orochimaru asked, dodging his strike. "Little bitty ANBU-chan is finally unsheathing his claws? How _impressive_. You think that your ultimate technique will help you? A stab to the heart won't kill a man without a heart!"

And it wasn't a lie. A stab to the heart could not kill a man without a heart, and you couldn't kill something that was already dead to begin with, anyway.

Love and friendship. _Please_. Those were just lies they cooked up by the village to rope every new generation into the shinobi life.

Two of the ANBU swung their swords at him. Orochimaru rolled his eyes, and blocked their strikes with his bare hands, letting his chakra do the work. For a moment he felt a wonderful satisfaction at watching the metal melt beneath his fingertips. But then a sharp pain ran up to his elbows, and that was all the warning he had to let go before a shower of sparks exploded from the steel, lighting up the dark canyon in silver-white flares.

Electrocution. It was not fun. Orochimaru glared at the receding chakra wires. Of course they would lead to Hatake.

Those stupidly brave children, daring to take up the front for him. He wondered how Kakashi would react to being responsible for their deaths. As they raised their swords again, Orochimaru leaped into the air and landed on their wrists, one foot on each. Using his knees, he forced them to cross their own blades with each other, and then, with a twist, he sent both ANBU flying in opposite directions – onto the weapons of their own allies.

There were horrified shouts and desperate apologies, none of which would do them any good. Words could not heal such wounds.

He heard them and laughed.

But not for long, because his arms were going to be useless for the remainder of the fight as a result of that attack. Even with his fast reaction, the damage had already been done. His muscle spasms were too strong to control or ignore; they would be more of a hindrance than an asset in this battle. To stop and heal them himself would be more trouble than it was worth. Electrical burns were a tricky thing to deal with, not so easy as just stitching cut skin back together.

Luckily, then, that he did not rely on hand seals for many of his jutsu. He still had plenty of chakra left; he could defeat them without arms. All the same, it was an irritating handicap, especially when surrounded. When he returned to Sound he would have to have Kabuto take a look at them. He did not doubt his medic-nin's abilities, but just in case, he should probably order some of his subjects to be prepared to give their arms up anyway.

Kakashi appeared in front of him, singing his hair with lightning chakra. Orochimaru spat a stream of fire at the boy, but at the last second he managed to twist out of the way. He flipped through the air, and landed on the ground behind him.

 _Damn_ , that kid was annoying. Orochimaru whipped around and caught him in the ribs just as he was about to stab him in the back, his other foot collapsing the knee of another ANBU who had tried to distract him from the front. As he bore down upon Kakashi, Orochimaru summoned a field of earth pikes below him, intending to rip him to pieces.

However, Kakashi escaped death yet again. Right before he hit the ground, he broke through some of the sharp tips of the pikes with a sweep of his Raikiri, creating just enough space for him to roll out of the way. Using the momentum of that spin, Kakashi vaulted himself back out of the spike pit, right into Orochimaru's feet. Orochimaru raised his leg to kick him through the wall, but before he could do so, Kakashi had dragged a knife down the back of his knee, severing the tendon.

He stumbled, and Kakashi took that moment to aim his electrified blade at his back again. _He's not aiming for the heart,_ Orochimaru realized. _He's going for the nerves this time around._

 _How I hate him._

Surrounding himself with wind chakra, he forced all of his opponents back several steps. Kakashi was forced to stop his attack to regain his footing, and that was all the time he needed to grab the boy by the neck and throw him backwards into the rock column behind him. He hit the stone with a hard _thwack_ , and went still. His box seal from earlier, which had been dependent on how he maintained his chakra, sputtered and died.

Good riddance.

Vaguely Orochimaru wondered if this was all part of yet another complex political plot involving the Konoha Council and Danzo Shimura. (Probably. There was _always_ something going on in that nursing home for murderers.) Then he decided that he didn't care. None of that affected him anymore. Let the Akatsuki and old Sarutobi duke it out in secret. All Orochimaru wanted was his own freedom.

 _In this world, it's every man for himself, and don't let the Hokage's cute little bits of propaganda fool you! You're all here to die; you might as well make the most of your life before then!_

Last time he'd felt this way, his parents – Orochimaru really didn't want to go back to that dark little place again. That was the first time he had tasted death.

But it certainly hadn't been the last.

They called him a monster, but if only they would _try_ it. To tear apart another living being and watch their innards writhe while they screamed…there was nothing as delicious as _control_.

On the inside, they were just like him.

And if they didn't like it, then too bad. Their precious little feelings were not his problem. They didn't matter; nothing in the world did. Orochimaru had come to terms with that long, long ago. Murder wouldn't have been so easy if he wasn't meant to kill.

The only things he could still live for were the experiments. Jutsu, power, knowledge…Ideas lasted longer than people. It wasn't so easy to kill an idea. But people – well, some things even Tsunade couldn't fix. Sakumo's wounds had been one of them. Not the tanto to the gut. Tsunade could have healed that if he had been found in time. But Sakumo Hatake had been dead long before he had ever killed himself.

Better to die alive than to live dead.

But he'd rather not be dead at all.

Immortality was so close he could taste it.

He moved forward, intending to end Kakashi's life. But the child he'd cleaved in half had been a different ANBU who'd gotten in the way. (Oopsy-daisy.) Then, another one of his comrades had snuck up behind him and managed to plant some exploding tags on his back, and he was forced to abandon Kakashi to deal with those rats.

They were terrified of him – as they should be, after watching him take down their unofficial leader in the span of a few seconds.

But they didn't give up. They simply came at him again. And again.

Ten years of being gone from the village, and he'd forgotten how frustrating Konoha nin were. All he had come here for was the Uchiha boy, who had been smuggled away in the chaos. If he tarried here any longer, he'd lose him. It seemed he'd have to break one of his personal rules, and stop making sure everyone he killed was actually dead. Knockouts would have to do, for now.

He hated them so much.

Because they didn't. Fucking. Give. Up.

Stupid Will of Fire crap, using "teamwork" as an excuse to gang up on someone and overwhelm them with swarming tactics.

(He ignored his own traitorous brain, which for some reason kept thinking, _I used to be one of them_.)

* * *

The first thing I noticed when we rounded the corner was the brick wall of Killer Intent that hit us once again, this time from behind. I swore as I watched even Naruto go down this time – back there had just been a bit of the excess residue, while here was the real deal. Despite this, however, none of us seemed keen on giving up, especially since we knew what was waiting for us on the other side if we did.

Naruto was as belligerent as ever, his face twisted into a snarl even when his knees refused to stand up. He was one of the few people I knew who would let their bodies quit before their minds gave up.

"Ho…kage…"

I rolled my eyes. _Typical Naruto. There's an S-class missing-nin coming after you and you're_ still _chasing your dreams._ And then: _what the heck am I doing, teasing Naruto? There's an S-class missing-nin chasing after_ you _, Shikamaru, and you're teasing Naruto!_

Ino let out a squeak. "Sasuke…kun…!" She was, surprisingly, the first person in our group to get moving again.

Maybe I shouldn't underestimate the power of an obsessive preteen crush.

 _AND FOR GOD'S SAKE DON'T THINK ABOUT THE LADY IN TANYU._

 _Huh,_ I realized as my mind started to clear. _Both determination_ and _humor can break the grip of killer intent. Interesting._

Past the dull haze, I could see an outline, menacing, tall, and snakelike, flickering against the walls. Then the rock crumbled once more, and finally, we were meeting Orochimaru face-to-face for the first time.

He'd left a trail of bodies behind him. I hoped they were just unconscious. But it was also equally likely that they were dead. Like the ANBU that had been carrying Sasuke. It's hard to fight when you're carrying someone on your back. Orochimaru had stabbed him through the head. Then, when the other ANBU had run up to get between us and him, he'd merely slapped her out of the way, as if she had been an annoying mosquito. She was slammed into the pile of rubble; I saw her go limp.

Maybe it was just a concussion, and not a snapped neck. I prayed it was just a concussion, and not a snapped neck.

We wouldn't be able to outrun him. The only option left was to stand and fight. But even with all of our combined strength, he'd still be able to destroy us with a flick of his fingers. Here we were, children, fresh out of the Academy and in way over our heads. I had no chance against this man. Even a whole legion of ANBU couldn't stand up to him.

I remembered my father's technique. The one I hadn't mastered yet.

 _There are terrible things in this world. Things that die but don't stay dead._

This was a perfect time to use it…

But I couldn't. It wasn't complete. No, I _couldn't_. Father had warned me against that. No messing around with that technique until I was allowed to, or I'd get stuck and become something even less human than what I was fighting now. And I had heard too many stories of what terrible things happened to people attempting things they weren't ready for.

 _Those who walk the shadows may very well become one with them._

No, I couldn't make that mistake. At best the technique would fail and I would be back where I started, but with precious time wasted. At worst I'd kill myself instead of Orochimaru.

He turned on us. "Move aside, children. All I want is the Last Uchiha."

"No."

"I _said_ move aside."

" _No._ "

He gave me another chance to back away. "You are trying my patience. I naturally have very little, and most of it has already been spent. I say this one more time: _move. Aside. Now._ "

I was about to hesitate, wondering what the right thing to do should be – if I backed away, he'd do – whatever he wanted to do to Sasuke, and leave the rest of us alone, maybe, but if I didn't, he'd just kill me and then do whatever he wanted to do to Sasuke _anyway_ , and damn it, what was the point of being noble if it would just bring a result even worse than pragmatism?

This "saving your friends" business was more of a morale booster, than anything else. In most situations where a comrade was in trouble, it was possible to save them _and_ complete the mission. Then, you'd have both a complete mission and a still alive shinobi. Or if not, then at least you'd still be alive to try again. People made up all these stories about love and kindness – and they _were_ important; I'd die for Ino and Naruto and Choji and even Kakashi-sensei, not that they'd need saving, any day – but to central command, the reasoning was slightly different. Lives and training were not cheap, so keeping every possible man was the better solution.

Of course, in my moment of indecision, Naruto jumped in and decide _for_ me.

"NO WAY, SNAKE FREAK!"

It would have been funny if I wasn't so terrified, because all it served to do was piss off Orochimaru even more.

I looked around, trying to find anything else I could use, and caught a glimpse of my wristband, where the deactivated summoning seal lay. If only these things would work. Then we'd all get out of this mess. But I didn't have enough knowledge to fix them. Any chakra I sparked against it simply looped back around the circuits uselessly, like a battery connected to itself.

 _When in doubt, go back to the basics. Don't mess around with the things you're not ready for._

Instinctively, I reached out with my shadow.

 _You're crazy, Shikamaru_ , I told myself. _You're crazy. That's Orochimaru, an S-class missing-nin, one of the Sannin, the Sandaime's most dangerous student, and you're trying to get him with the_ Shadow Possession Jutsu _of all things?_

 _Yes, I am._

 _It doesn't matter if I'm just a Genin. It doesn't matter if I'm only twelve. I know what the hell I'm doing and that's not going to change just because I'm fighting one of the Legendary Sannin._

 _THAT DOESN'T MATTER!_ my self-preservation screamed. _You're STILL CRAZY!_

 _It's only crazy if it fails. If it works, it's genius._

No one here was strong enough to defeat Orochimaru.

No one except… _himself._

* * *

Orochimaru licked his lips. _The Sharingan…_ here it was, within his grasp…he was so close…

Suddenly, he couldn't move. Orochimaru glanced down, only to meet the exceedingly smug face of the Nara boy. _Kagemane._ But how? He had made sure that his shadow was nowhere within the range of the boy's technique, and the tunnels his snakes had dug were all the way back there…what else could he have used –

That was when Orochimaru noticed the tiny little gopher-sized hole behind him that hadn't been there before. A Nara with Earth jutsu. Now that just wasn't fair. Next they'd be telling him about a Yamanaka with lightning jutsu. Which was highly possible, given the sensei of this team.

The boy was fast; he'd give that to him. He must have formed it while his eyes had been on Sasuke Uchiha.

No matter. The fact that he had Orochimaru trapped was a less-than-optimal situation, but not impossible to remedy. He began to flare his chakra in the opposite direction to the Kagemane's grip. Now, the stalemate would only last as long as their relative endurance levels. It was a war of attrition, and, genius or not, the Nara boy was still a child with limited chakra reserves. Already he was trembling from the effort he was exerting. Soon enough, he would run out of energy and have to let go, and that was when Orochimaru would strike.

Naras.

Yet another little bunch of geniuses of Konoha.

Yet another herd of lambs going to the slaughter.

In desperation, his friends began attacking him, while the effects of the paralysis lasted. But it did them just about as much good as it did the ANBU back there. Once the Nara boy collapsed of exhaustion and had to let go, he'd just kill them all. All he was doing right now was buying them time. What a headache.

He'd kill them. They all deserved to die, except for the Uchiha boy. His arms might be out of order because of the Nara's meddling, but he still had his fangs. If only he could just bite them all and get it over with, but the Cursed Seal he had developed was limited to only one application at a time. It just so happened that the one he had stored up in his fangs right now had been prepared specifically with Sasuke Uchiha in mind, and chances were using it on any other subject would negate its effectiveness.

It seemed he'd have to settle for the lower jaw – and currently, Orochimaru was already feeling extremely unforgiving to the young "genius" who thought himself good enough to bind a Sannin.

(Actually, he was extremely unforgiving to anyone who reminded him of himself, like most other people. Stupid little geniuses who all would fall down at one point or another.)

 _You don't know what you're doing, do you, you little idiot? I'm not joking. Get out of here. Run. Go. Now. Get away. I might be trying to kill you, but that doesn't mean I'm not telling the truth. Run. Go. Get out of here. Get away. Or something else will kill you, slowly and painfully, and I promise you then that what I am doing now will seem merciful in comparison._

 _Because that "something else" is called Konoha._

 _So please. Take this advice from a man with more experience than you. (Too much more experience than you.)_ _Run. Now. While you still can. It's not too late to save yourself._

 _Why won't you die already?_

All he had come here for was the Last Uchiha. Why couldn't they understand that?

Oh, well. He had _tried_ to warn them, and they hadn't listened. As expected. No one ever listened, not to him. But that worked out better for him, because it just meant that he couldn't be held accountable for what he was about to do next.

"Fine then," Orochimaru shrugged. _I gave you more than enough chances, children, and you blew them all._ "If you will not allow me to go around you, then I will cut _through_ you."

The shadow disconnected.

And he opened his jaws and lunged.

* * *

There were fangs rushing at my face.

 _Now or never._

I ripped off my wristband.

And felt a sharp pain in my back –

 _Verdict: You're crazy._

Then I saw Orochimaru scream and fall to his knees.

 _But also a genius._

* * *

 _FUCK._

That was all Kakashi's normally eloquent mind could come up with.

The fact that Orochimaru had just broken through the walls of the canyon maze instead of walking around them like a normal, polite person would meant that everything that was happening right now was in Kakashi's range of sight. He could see _everything_ that was going on.

One, Orochimaru was headed for Sasuke Uchiha.

And two, Shikamaru was standing in his way.

 _Meaning Orochimaru was headed straight for Shikamaru, too._

Shikamaru was his student.

 _Meaning Shikamaru was on his team._

 _Meaning it was his job to protect him._

But he was here, and Shikamaru was all the way over there.

 _Meaning he wouldn't be able to reach him in time._

Another teammate was about to be killed before his face today.

Even though he had promised himself he'd never let it happen again.

Not after Obito. Or Rin. Or Minato-sensei.

There was a ringing sensation in his skull.

 _Ringing._

 _Bells._

 _Bell test._

 _A flash of purple from the tree line, and something had collided with his hip, and of_ course _, Kakashi, you_ idiot _, you_ can _still save them –_

 _Kawarimi no Jutsu._

* * *

 _What just happened?_

One moment, I was staring straight at Orochimaru's gaping mouth, my life flashing before my eyes, and the next, I had impacted the wall, and was now lying in the dirt surrounded by the unconscious bodies and cooling corpses. The sharp pain in my back had just been a sharp rock.

In my place, stood – one last ANBU.

I was confused.

 _How…?_

And then I saw it.

One last ANBU. Or, more accurately, one of the first. One of them, dazed but not dead.

He'd substituted himself…with _me_.

There was a gleam of polished metal as he drew his sword. My mind started shutting down. I tried to fight against it, but it was no use.

I blacked out.

* * *

The sharp pain Kakashi felt in his shoulder barely registered as he saw his katana meet its mark. There was something morbidly satisfying about watching the blade sink straight into the roof of Orochimaru's mouth and exit out the back of his head. It didn't kill him, but that didn't matter. The important thing was that Shikamaru was now on the other side of the corridor, safe from harm, and the force of his stab had slowed down Orochimaru's momentum enough to prevent the guy taking a chunk out of the Uchiha kid as well.

Orochimaru was so furious, the walls of the canyon were shaking. He was screaming something about _"that seal was a one-time use, brat!"_ Not that Kakashi could bring himself to give two flying shits about the snake Sannin's nonexistent feelings.

There was something inky and bloody running down his back, but he ignored it.

 _What?_ he thought sarcastically. _Did I screw up your brilliant evil plan for the Last Uchiha? Well, get in line. I ruin plans all the time, and just because you're one of the Legendary Sannin doesn't mean you're any safer from_ me _._

"Fool," Orochimaru gasped. "You think a sword will stop me?"

 _You're no longer moving forward, so I'd say yes. Two equal but opposite forces moving against the same object will cancel each other out. Which you would know, if you had bothered to study elementary physics instead of dicking around with those quack experiments of yours._

Kakashi smirked behind his mask despite himself. "It just did."

"Still as much of a smart-aleck as ever, I see," Orochimaru narrowed his eyes. "I should cut out that tongue of yours." He took a step forward – and immediately collapsed, his charred, shriveled legs snapping underneath him.

Kakashi jumped back in shock, and as he did so, his Sharingan caught a glimpse of the sealing wristbands on the competitors. They weren't just disabled, as they had been before. They had been completely burnt out.

As was Orochimaru's entire chakra system.

 _Too much chakra, flowing in the wrong direction. The force has nowhere to go. So it explodes outwards, like a clogged pressure pipe._

But how?

He looked at Orochimaru. And then at the sealing wristbands. And then back to Orochimaru. And then at the blackened strip of ground where Shikamaru's shadow had been before.

 _The Kagemane is a chakra construct. It can conduct energy, just like a seal can store it._

 _Shikamaru, you're a genius._

He had used Orochimaru's blocks on the maze's summoning-seal system to redirect his own chakra _against_ him. With little more than his clan's most basic technique and his own opponent's power, he had reduced one of the most dangerous men in the world to a complete mess.

A completely _defenseless_ mess.

...Now when in the world would he ever get a chance like this again?

This man had tried to kill a person from his team. Whatever fear Kakashi had felt before was gone. Today was the day he would watch Orochimaru suffer and today was the day he'd enjoy it.

Kakashi let the charges build up in his hands. He normally didn't use this technique, because it was bad – not bad as in a bad technique, but bad as in not-much-better-than-the-people-I-fight. But in cases like this, where a job needed to be done, and done thoroughly…

Orochimaru needed a proper mind in order to continue possessing people, and he couldn't have a mind if he didn't have a brain, right?

"Look away, children," he ordered.

They stood there, frozen.

"Go," he repeated. "Take care of your friend."

"But you're injured, ANBU-san – " Hinata Hyuga said.

"Doesn't matter. Leave." _Injured? Where? Ah, hell, it doesn't matter._

They nodded silently, and went behind the walls, with Asuma's two remaining students carrying Sasuke Uchiha, while Ino and Naruto's clones took care of Shikamaru. He let them clear observation range before turning back to Orochimaru.

"You can't kill me with – " Orochimaru rasped angrily.

"Bitch, _please_ ," Kakashi interrupted him. "I invented Chidori when I was just thirteen. If you thought a massive chakra drain as ridiculously loud and visible as _that_ was my only original technique since then, you've got another thing coming, old man."

"What – "

"You should have left the boy alone," Kakashi whispered, " _because I'm a monster, too_."

And he clapped his hands over the Sannin's ears.

His victim screamed, and arched off the ground as the force of a thousand electric needles rocketed through his head, painting the corridors with the liquefied contents of his skull.

 _That's really disgusting,_ the silly part of Kakashi's mind giggled.

 _Yeah, it is,_ he agreed. _Now, what about that injury?_

His head was fuzzing up. His shoulder was burning.

Out of the corner of his slowly blackening vision, he saw a dark, circular pattern of three comma-like spots forming on the skin of his shoulder.

A pattering of feet. He felt someone lift him onto a stretcher. _Reinforcements. Thank goodness._

"Apologies, senpai," someone whispered. "I tried to get here as fast as I could, but _someone_ stole my armor and uniform."

 _Tenzou, you're a good man,_ Kakashi thought.

Then there was nothing else but the burning on his shoulder.

* * *

BONUS #8

 _Ode to the Redshirted ANBU_

Here's a poem for the nameless ANBU who died

Because I'm too lazy

To think of more animal names

A poem for the ANBU who are

Supposed to be Konoha's elite

But we never get to see it

Because they only appear when

Really powerful guys show up

And die shortly after for dramatic purposes

Just to show how powerful these enemies are

After all, they're nameless side characters

It's hard to care about them

Compared to the characters who actually have names

Which is why they're relegated to cannon fodder

I'm sorry it must be this way, dear ANBU

Such is the life of faceless service

But look on the bright side

You're not 100% useless

If you hadn't been there to tag-team Orochimaru

And buy time for everyone to run

All our main characters would have died

And then we wouldn't have a story

Anyway, this poem is in freestyle

Because I'm too lazy

To think of good rhymes

And I suck

Goodbye, redshirted ANBU

You will be missed

For about five seconds


	15. Fallout

**A/N: 100 reviews for one update. Holy crap. Here's chapter 15, guys. You've earned it.**

 **I normally don't rush my writing (I like leaving time for editing, etc.) – but if you guys kill my inbox like that again you can expect me to shift this to the top of my priorities list.**

* * *

BONUS #9

 _Cards Against Shinobi_

What's the fastest way to a girl's heart? Chidori

Jiraiya's unpublished work: _Icha Icha_ yaoi fanfiction.

You know what never gets old? The Fourth Hokage

What better birthday present for Naruto than dead parents?

This year's record setter for blood donations goes to…the Uchiha clan!

* * *

 _The Chunin Exams – Phase 2 end base_

When I could finally open my eyes, I was lying on a bed, indoors. Ino was sitting beside me, brushing her hair. With her fingers, since she didn't have a comb, as we didn't have the time or space for such luxuries out in the field. And she wasn't so much brushing her hair as she was pulling at it in chunks. But I like to say she was brushing her hair, because it just sounds nicer.

"I take it we made it out alive?" I asked. My muscles felt dry and limp, like an underinflated water balloon, and my whole body felt numb. "What the heck happened? And where's Naruto?"

"It's a little past the first day. We just got here, actually. Naruto just walked out to go talk to Choji's team," she explained. "We grouped up with them, because of the whole snake thing. We figured we might as well, since the more the merrier, right? Anyway, we both had injured people. Naruto had a bunch of his clones carry you, and Choji carried Sasuke. You were out for quite a while because of chakra exhaustion…"

"I – what?" I asked eloquently.

"You used the _Shadow Bind_ to hold down _Orochimaru_ , an _S-class missing-nin_ , you idiot! It's a miracle you're alive now; you should have _died_!" Ino snapped angrily, before wincing at her tone and choice of words. "Sorry. I was just worried."

"We would have died anyway," I tried to explain. "I'd rather risk my life doing something than 100% die doing nothing – "

"That hardly matters," she interrupted. "You still have chakra exhaustion. The medic-nin on base said you'd need a week's worth of rest."

I nodded, digesting the information. It did not come lightly to me. That I would be bedridden for a whole week – it seemed like such a waste of time. I could be doing so much in a week. Training. Practicing new techniques. Or, most importantly, researching everything that was going on around me right now. My friends and I had just been attacked and nearly killed by an insane ex-student of the Third Hokage. This was not okay.

"So…what else happened?" I asked.

Ino sighed. "Anyway, when we got here, there were two other teams that had already arrived before us – those creepy guys from the Sand were first, and then Team 8 – Kurenai's team – also got out pretty quickly, because Shino used his bugs to shield them from the chakra-eating vines. So they were already out of the way when Orochimaru finally attacked. We're in the little base at the top of the canyon. They took us up there when we made it out of the maze, you see."

"You didn't run into any other trouble along the way?"

"No. Hinata's Byakugan told us the paths to avoid, and Naruto's air jutsu kept the worst of the drugged gas away. Not that we needed it; I think they stopped releasing the gas after the snakes attacked. There was still some residue hanging around, though, so the wind jutsu cleared out the paths. But other teams weren't so lucky. You were right – most of them eliminated themselves with infighting shortly after the drug was released," Ino told me.

I closed my eyes, thinking. "So – Orochimaru – "

Ino wrung her hands uncomfortably. "When he…I don't know… _died_ …the ANBU squads that came later to take him away – they said something about an network being down – probably our wristband things – and I saw a couple ANBU trailing behind us as we made our way here – but we didn't run into any other teams on the way thanks to Hinata – so I guess we just got an automatic pass for making it in on time. I think they just stopped caring about the wristbands, since the whole sealing system was apparently destroyed."

"Really? He's dead? Just like that?" I asked. "But…he was totally destroying us back there. What happened? After I got knocked out?"

"I – I don't _know_. I mean, I _hope_ he's dead, but…well, that ANBU used the Replacement Jutsu on you, right when Orochimaru was about to bite through you to get to Sasuke-kun, and he took your place instead. I saw him stab Orochimaru through the head, except that he didn't die. Like, he got stabbed straight through the mouth and everything, but he still kept on talking. And then something weird happened, and then I couldn't really tell what went on after that; it all happened so fast," she said, her words coming out faster and faster in her nervousness. "One moment, Orochimaru was, you know, trying to kill all of us, and then the next, he just collapsed."

"Huh," I muttered to myself. "So it _did_ work after all."

"What do you mean?" Ino asked.

"It's hard to explain," I said. "Basically…when I used the Kagemane, I wasn't _just_ trying to pin Orochimaru down, otherwise I could have held him for a bit longer. I was using my shadow to conduct chakra between the seal on my wristband and Orochimaru, because the easiest way to break out of a Shadow Bind is with reverse chakra cycling. So, I channeled my own shadow across the wristband, using the chakra block to control the direction of flow of his chakra. It hits the seal, rebounds, and travels back down the shadow over to him – "

" – completely destroying his chakra system, " Ino deadpanned. "And you thought to attempt that, without even knowing anything about sealing or testing it beforehand? You're insane!"

"I prefer 'creative'," I mumbled.

"Well, I'm glad you're happy with yourself for getting that to work," Ino said, "because you ended up taking out the rest of the sealing network in the process."

"I thought it was already taken out by Orochimaru," I said.

"It was only blocked. They were working on fixing it, and then you just burnt through the whole thing. Look at that," she said, pointing to a stripe of ash on her wristband. "It's completely unsalvageable. Because of you."

"In my defense, I didn't _intend_ for that to happen," I protested. "The sealing network, I mean. The chakra stuff, yes. I don't know enough about sealing to say anything else. But that shouldn't have killed him. At least, not by itself."

"I don't know what happened after that. The ANBU that substituted you with himself, he…he told us to all leave. So I never got to see what he did. I'm _guessing_ he took care of it?" Ino closed her eyes. "But before we left…that guy…I think he got bitten. By Orochimaru. When he drew his sword and stabbed Orochimaru, Hinata said she saw this weird shape form on his shoulder, and then Orochimaru started screaming about curse seals or something."

I sat up and scratched my head. "Curse seal?"

"Don't ask me what that is," Ino held up her hands. "I don't know. They didn't explain. It's a seal, and it's a curse."

Curse seals. I knew what seals were, but not curse seals. Sealing, in general, was a ridiculously complicated and confusing ninja art, made even worse by the destruction of Whirlpool. Though versatile in theory, its applications were usually limited to all but the best users, some of whom spent their whole lives researching it. Most of all, it required a great deal of patience and critical thinking skills.

To most nin, who were only interested in getting strong enough to survive – less about learning jutsu theory for the beauty of it – the effort was great and the payoff was little. Even those who were interested in it didn't start out with sealing right away – they went for techniques more useful in the field, like the three cores: ninjutsu, genjutsu, or taijutsu. The days for fighting with wholly sealing were long past, if they ever even existed.

"What happened to that ANBU?" I asked.

"I don't know either," Ino said. "Like I said, we left as soon as he told us to."

"Oh." I rubbed my eyes. "Was he still alive, though?"

"Yeah, I mean, he was walking and talking all right," Ino said. "Oh – hey there, Naruto."

Naruto bounded into the room, still as cheery as ever. I was glad for that. As long as Naruto could still stay upbeat, we'd be okay.

"Is he awake?" Naruto asked, peering around Ino's form at me. "Oh, good, he is. Shikamaru, you wouldn't believe what happened after that! It sucks that you missed it. Anyway – "

"I already told him," Ino snapped. "Go sit down. We all need our rest. We'll be stuck here for the next day while we wait for the other teams to finish."

"Fine," Naruto said, a forced smile on his face. He wasn't any happier about our situation, either, but he was unusually good at disguising his pain with cheerfulness. It seemed like all those years of being the class clown had paid off, after all. "Isn't it awesome, though? We're the three Rookie teams, and we all made it through first!"

"Yeah, yeah, don't let it get to your head," Ino smiled.

Naruto plopped down on the bed on the other side of the room. "I walked past Team 10's room on my way back here. Sasuke's awake, Ino. If you want to go visit him now."

"Maybe later," Ino whispered. "Shikamaru, you sure you're okay?"

"I'm fine. Just tired." I turned to look at Naruto. "How's Sasuke?"

"Doing great, actually. He woke up shortly after we made it to the base. He's fine, no injuries or anything. I heard him laughing with Choji and Hinata."

Were my ears working properly? "I'm sorry – Naruto, did you say Sasuke was _laughing_?"

"I'm not making this up. Not a snort, or a chuckle. Full-out laughter. I don't know what Choji or Hinata did to him, but he's no longer the Mr. Grumpy-pants we knew from the Academy." He sat down on the side of my bed. "Feeling better, Shikmaru?"

"Yeah, I guess." If you could ignore the chakra exhaustion and all that. It was a really uncomfortable experience. My whole body felt like it was stuffed with foam packaging peanuts.

I glanced around the room again. The bed I was lying on – more of a cot, really – was the only one in the room, which was, in truth, about as big as a closet.

A regular closet, not one of Ino's closets.

I felt a little bad, taking up all the space. I tried to sit up, but as soon as I moved even a little bit, the room started spinning, so I was forced to lie back down and stay still to curb the nausea.

"Stay still!" Ino ordered. "What part of 'you have chakra exhaustion and need to rest' don't you understand? Honestly."

"Where are you guys sleeping?" I asked.

Ino shrugged. "We were just planning to take over the hallway. There's enough room for all of the Rookie Nine if we put our bedrolls down the right way. Anyway. The only other people here right now are those kids from Sand – you know, _those_ kids – and they took over the lounge in the back."

The Sand kids. The Suna economy tanking. The suspicious-looking candidate. Then this attack. So much going on, and all of it seemed to fit together sensibly somehow…it was just the matter of _why_. I knew these events were related, just not how. I sat back, and thought about what I knew before the exams compared to now.

And, most importantly, the reason why we had been entered in the first place.

Why? Why were we even here? Though getting a rank advancement sounded like a great honor, it did come with consequences. The same as graduating early. I'd learned too much about that from my father. _The Councilman._ What did he want? What could he _do_ , that would force the Jonin instructors to take such drastic action, to enter all of their precious clan heirs, still rookie genin, into a potentially deadly competition, _all at once_?

It just didn't make sense to me. None of it made sense.

And that really annoyed me, because things were supposed to make sense. These people, from the Hokage down to individual team leaders – they were the ones making the decisions that would affect my life. Would they really be so careless, to risk the lives of – basically all the clan heirs of Konoha – just for a few rank advancements that no one would care about in a few years?

I didn't want to admit it, but I really was scared. For my own safety, and for that of my friends. It wasn't the same type of oppressive fear I'd felt under Orochimaru's Killer Intent, or the fiery type of fear that automatically reared its head in anyone fighting for his life. It was a more subtle sort of terror, the anticipation of the uncertain. The question, _what will become of us?_ And the even worse one, _is it even in our control?_

I _liked_ to think that I had some modicum of control over my own life. But this…all this…it was making me re-evaluate. How many of my choices were my own, really?

Already, I was planning the snooping I'd do as soon as I got home.

Of course, Naruto just had to go and interrupt my precious silence with his noise. "Hey guys…I was kinda thinking about this before…but you know that ANBU guy that totally saved your life back there, Shikamaru?"

"Yeah, what about him?" Ino asked, her face showing that she, like me, was still trying to wrap her mind around a _laughing_ Sasuke Uchiha. "I'm sure he's fine. Konoha has the best medics and sealing masters of any Hidden Village. Kakashi-sensei said so."

"Funny you should mention Kakashi-sensei," Naruto said, "because…well, before, when the snake attacked us, one of my clones was up there, investigating, before it got dispelled. Anyway, that ANBU guy, with the same mask, was using some weird lightning jutsu."

"And your point is?"

"Well, we don't know any other really good lightning users in Konoha besides Kakashi-sensei now, do we? So – is it just me, or am I making too many leaps here? Why are you looking at me like that, Ino?"

"Naruto, Kakashi-sensei is a Jonin teacher of a participating team. That's not allowed," Ino said. "Besides, he _quit_ ANBU a long time ago. He said he was never going back. For all we know, that guy could have just been someone on Kakashi-sensei's team that he taught a lightning jutsu to. Anyone can learn a ninjutsu technique, even if it's not their affinity. And maybe Kakashi-sensei met up with him later, and told him to keep an eye on us, or something, if anything happened…" Ino trailed off. "I mean, Kakashi-sensei wouldn't leave us and go _back_ to ANBU, right? He already quit!"

We were all silent at that. On the inside, I seriously hoped that it was just a mutual acquaintance, and that the person who had gotten a Curse Seal on himself on my behalf was someone I didn't know. Because the only alternative was unimaginable – that _Kakashi-sensei_ was now out of commission somewhere, with something that _Orochimaru_ made stuck to him…

But logically, there was no other explanation. Kakashi-sensei had been a "tester" for the first phase, even though that was twenty different ways of illegal (after all, we, his team, were competing in that same exam). I was pretty sure the Sandaime knew he had been planning this, and turned a blind eye to it. So Kakashi-sensei had been privy to more information about – whatever Orochimaru had been doing. And he infiltrated the exams to protect us.

Which left the question – why had we been entered in the first place, if he knew it was going to be dangerous enough that he'd have to follow us around? It seemed like every answer I came to only caused more questions. I needed data desperately, but I didn't have any. I looked back at Naruto and Ino; they were locked in an awkward silence. I wondered if I should tell them about what I had deduced. I didn't want to lower their spirits, but would it be kinder to let them find out later, or give them the harsh reality now?

I ended up asking, very vaguely, "Can't we ask someone…you know, about him?"

"I tried," Naruto gestured to the door with his chin. "No one knew anything about it. None of the Chunin examiners know anything about the ANBU that were around. There weren't supposed to be _any_ ANBU proctoring a Chunin exam. It's designed and administered by Chunin – with Jonin as the head examiners for each section. None of them really have any contact with the outside world – _or_ ANBU – until the phase is over, because they have to be around here, watching the examinees, at all times."

"They said it was they're not allowed to speak with anyone while the exams are still going on," Ino said. "There's all these really strict rules against people on the outside helping the Genin inside cheat. Plus, apparently all of the Chunin and Jonin like to place bets on the exams and stuff, and they don't like anyone getting any insider info. So even if they wanted to ask someone on the outside about Kakashi-sensei, they couldn't."

"I guess we'll just have to wait until this phase is over and they let us out," Naruto shrugged, trying his best to be nonchalant.

"Yeah," I lied. "Kakashi-sensei is fine."

We hoped.

* * *

 _ANBU Emergency Medical Services_

 _This is not good_ , the Sandaime Hokage thought. _This was not how it was supposed to go._

He had been prepared for sabotage by Sand.

He had _not_ been prepared for Orochimaru also joining in on the "fun".

 _Kakashi_. Hiruzen felt his stomach drop. _This is all my fault._ The fact that things worked out as well as they did – which wasn't very well at all, but once again, it could have been _much, much_ worse – seemed unreal to him.

"How is he?" Hiruzen asked.

"Alive, but we're not sure of anything beyond that," said ANBU Raven, the resident sealing expert (as Jiraiya wasn't around). "The seal was designed specifically for Sasuke Uchiha, not him. His chakra type and DNA markers are incompatible."

The Sandaime steeled his face into a grim frown. "What effects will that have on him?"

"Right now? We are not sure," ANBU Raven admitted. "We've done our best to stabilize the seal, slow down its effects, but…"

"But what?"

The sealing specialist trailed off uncertainly.

"Well?" the Sandaime cocked an eyebrow at him.

"…Sir," ANBU Raven answered finally, "there seems to be, ah…"

"Spit it out," the Sandaime urged.

"Well, this isn't _definite_ , but there are traces of, Orochimaru's, well," ANBU Raven stuttered, "how should I put this…I don't know how to describe it, exactly, but his _presence_ is there. Not even his chakra, but something more sinister. It's like…a controlling factor, basically. It's almost as if…it's almost as if his _mind_ is in that thing…"

Hiruzen paled. _Oh god no…oh please, god no…Orochimaru, please tell me you didn't…_

"Take me to him," the Sandaime ordered.

Swallowing uncomfortably, the ANBU soldier did as he was told. What Hiruzen saw confirmed his greatest fears.

 _So this…so this is how you've been making yourself immortal, Orochimaru._

He straightened his back.

"Recall Jiraiya _immediately_ ," he barked. "And tell him that it is a _direct order._ An _emergency._ "

"Yes, sir!"

"Place Kakashi Hatake under the strictest level of surveillance in the meantime. Under absolutely no circumstances are you to let him out of sight!"

"Understood, sir."

"And relay to the general troops that there has been a change in plans. Orochimaru will not stay dead, but as long as he is out of commission, we might as well start moving against him."

* * *

 _ANBU Emergency Medical Services_

Admittedly, Jiraiya had always, from since he was a small and stupid boy, to the amazingly handsome and unforgettable shinobi he was now, had that annoying type of super-macho persona. You know, that guy that always pretended that he was tough enough not to need any help? Yeah, that guy. Come to think of it, all the cool people acted that way. That really funny Uchiha boy that used to follow Minato around all the time and pretend he wasn't hungry when Kushina came around with food was like that, too.

Not that it helped him any, in a situation like this.

Effing Kakashi. The brat never knew when to stop, did he?

 _Like teacher like student, and like father like son,_ Jiraiya mused. _What sort of trouble did you get yourself into_ this _time, Sakumo-spawn? Took a curse seal in the shoulder to save one of your students, did you? You bleeding idiot. You do realize it's going to be even harder for me to cure it now? If that mark had made it to the person it was intended for, he at least would have a good chance of living when I finally got to him with the seals. With you, I'll have to waste my time trying to save your life before I even_ think _of sealing away the mark._

 _Stupid ungrateful little brats these days. Always trying to make the world a better damn place. Except Sakumo was a few months older than me, I think. So maybe not little, in his case. But still. Ungrateful little shits._

 _Poor little Yahiko. Nagato. Konan._

Jiraiya shook his head and just picked up his own speed. He might be aging, but he was in no way old, damn it. In the end, it had been Sakumo who had been a greater friend to him than Orochimaru, and damn it all to hell if he was going to let Sakumo's brat (who was actually pretty damn funny as long as _you_ weren't the butt of his jokes) die at the hands of _that_ thing.

He arrived in Konoha before nightfall, and almost immediately, a team of ANBU had descended upon him like a flock of vultures and escorted him to the isolated little compound where they were housing Hatake.

One look at the cursed seal, and his toes went numb.

The inky black marks had spread from the shoulder. They were now bleeding down all the way to the upper arm, and curling around the left side of his neck and face like a diseased fungus. Kakashi was fighting valiantly; he really was – even without the Sharingan, Jiraiya could see the bright white lines of his chakra pushing as hard as it could back against the poison in his veins.

Unfortunately, this reverse reaction was exactly what was hurting him. The war going on within his body was just too much for the thin walls to withstand, and each contact point was decaying his chakra pathways just a little bit more.

Orochimaru really had done a number on him. Either way, he lost. If his chakra didn't fight back, the poison would gradually take control over his body. But when he did, the stress would destroy the chakra pathways themselves, allowing the poison to come forth anyway, albeit at a much slower rate.

It was the classic issue of incompatibility and rejection. Just like organ transplants and tissue donors had to be checked against the receiver, so did – well, sealing grafts. Whatever the hell Orochimaru was playing around with now.

There was no way any regular sealing team could have done anything to prevent this. Not that he was insulting their skills. They were good men and hardworking people, and they had taken the best course of action that had been available to them – stabilize, slow, and wait for better help. It was thanks to their work that the curse had not already spread all over the body so that it was _beyond_ even _his_ help by now. They had even done their best to prevent, or at least delay, the total deterioration of the boy's chakra pathways, for which Jiraiya was glad.

But their power could not match that of a Sannin.

"What is it, Jiraiya?" Sarutobi-sensei asked.

Jiraiya looked up gravely.

Ninety percent. That had been the rate of failure for this particular experiment. Ninety percent of Orochimaru's test subjects…

There really was only one proper diagnosis for what he had just seen.

"He's dying."


	16. Cut Their Threads

BONUS #10

Commentary for chapter 14 has been posted on the forum. I was going to put it here, but then it would have taken up too much space.

* * *

 _ANBU Emergency Medical Services_

Hiruzen Sarutobi's heart nearly stopped right then and there. "What did you say?"

"He's dying," Jiraiya confirmed with finality as he got to work immediately. The curse seal lines were mere inches away from Kakashi's heart. If he had arrived even thirty minutes later, it would have been too late. "But he's not dead yet. I think I can save him. Well, more like, buy him a few more decades."

"Oh. All right, then."

"But there are three problems. One, I do not know how much of him I can save at this point. If all goes well, then chances are he won't die because of this curse." That he'd probably fall in battle to something else shinobi-related was left unsaid between them – they both knew the truth, anyway; there was no point in aggravating it any further. "If I'm going to be optimistic, I can also probably stop the spread of the poison completely," Jiraiya said, setting up the proper barriers. "So he won't deteriorate any further over time. But – don't get your hopes up. Anyway, that's problem number one."

"What are the other two?" the Sandaime asked.

"Two, I cannot stop what damage that has already been done," Jiraiya said. "So all _this_ crap will probably be stuck here for as long as he lives. _If_ he survives. I'm not too sure about anything at this point. His body could react in a variety of ways, regardless of what help I give him. In the best-case scenario, it might just end up being a benign parasite, like his Sharingan. There is also a chance, however, that it could negatively interfere with his chakra pathways and cause anything from mild discomfort to a permanent handicap for the rest of his life. It may, in severe cases, completely cripple his chakra network and render him unable to use any chakra again."

"Unable to use chakra," Hiruzen breathed.

"That's the worst case, short of death," Jiraiya said. "I don't want to get too pessimistic before I even begin, so I will note now that the most likely case will be a partial loss. The rest of him will be fine, hopefully, but I can't make promises for what has already been affected. Chakra-wise, of course. The problem is completely isolated within his chakra network because of the nature of the seal, so he'll still be able to use taijutsu. Like that loud green one with the funky eyebrows."

"Maito Gai," Hiruzen corrected.

"Whatever. Don't care," Jiraiya said curtly. "Because the third problem is that _this_ ," he swept his hand across the black mass on Kakashi's side, "will take me an _ass_ ton of work. And I really do mean an _ass_ ton."

"How much is this…'ass ton' you speak of?" Hiruzen asked.

"At least two days. Maybe even three. And I'll be working straight through the nights, no breaks. He'll need intensive care for that whole time. I'll probably have a few clones running at a time so I can at least get enough sleep and food to not make any stupid mistakes, but it's still going to be a hell of a miserable time for me." Jiraiya began angrily ripping what superficial remnants of the curse seal he could from Kakashi's skin. Already naturally pale, he was an even sicklier shade of white underneath the bright fluorescent lights of the compound, making the ugly dark markings stand out even more. "So, why don't you go out there, and do your little Hokage thing, and tell all your people that I don't want to be bothered by _any_ distractions until I give the all-clear. And when I say _no distractions_ I really do mean _no distractions_ , sensei. One false step could lead to this entire operation falling to pieces. Only unless there's something that's going to end up killing us both anyway, do I want a messenger down here telling me to run for my life."

"If that's what you need," Hiruzen sighed, and turned to leave.

For Kakashi, he would do it. It was the least he could give him. And, in all honesty, Hiruzen felt that out of moral obligation he should be doing _more_ to repay Kakashi for all he had done to him in the past few days. It was thanks to him that the plan had gone so right even when it all had gone so wrong. This could very easily have ended in a Sand invasion _and_ a wayward Sasuke Uchiha after all, despite their greatest precautions against it.

Now, at least, the situation of the Sand was precarious at best, and Orochimaru wouldn't be causing any trouble for quite some time. His former student might have made himself immortal, but his power meant nothing without a fully operational nervous system to control it. Wherever Orochimaru was, it wasn't here; he'd abandoned his body as soon as it was clear that the mess was unsalvageable, just as he abandoned anything that was devoid of its former use to him.

Really, what a way to reward a man who had helped tip the scale in their favor – with an uneraseable curse mark.

Although, the Hokage also felt that he shouldn't be forced to take credit for _all_ of the blame for all of the cruelties that life had dealt Kakashi Hatake. The Hokage himself had only given the orders, unfair as they were – the rest of that had been a combination of other conspiring individuals, and Kakashi's own terrible luck. He had paid for his natural-born genius with his misfortune, a victim of his own success. That was how the world worked, for shinobi. The talented ones always fell the hardest. It was the rule.

 _Excuses, excuses,_ Hiruzen snorted. _Are you really blaming all this on bad luck, of all things?_

 _Like you could have done better,_ the Sandaime replied. _It's so easy to be morally upstanding when you're not calling the shots, Hiruzen._

 _Maybe you should let me call the shots then, Hokage-sama,_ Hiruzen told him.

 _And Konoha would be overrun by traitors and demons in a week,_ the Sandaime declared with finality. _You know it's true._

 _It already is,_ Hiruzen shrugged. _Just look at yourself._

 _At least I'm kind enough to pretend I'm not,_ said the Sandaime.

Even if someone came along and flipped the world on its side, it would still turn. None of them could help what was happening to them right now.

 _None of us can help – ? Listen to yourself speak!_ Hiruzen laughed to himself. _You call that kindness, Hokage-sama?_

* * *

 _The Temporary Sunagakure Base_

While the Hokage fretted about Konohagakure no Sato, Sunagakure no Sato was fretting about the Kazekage – or rather, their sudden lack of one.

It was an entirely different, but no less dire, problem.

Sunagakure was the least populated of all the Hidden Villages, and that had both its upsides and downsides. More downsides than upsides, actually. In everything, from manpower to economy, they would be outnumbered. There was the idea that with less people, they would be able to be more focused in individual training per man – which was true. Baki liked to think that the Genin from Suna, in this round of Chunin Exams, at least, were, on average, superior to the Genin from Konoha. Only the best were allowed in, and only the best were allowed out. Not like Konoha, which handed out forehead protectors even to kids who couldn't use chakra.

But what Konoha lacked in average ability, they made up for with their very top members. The spread in skill was just insane. Most of the Konoha nin were nothing special – but as soon as one of their Sannin or White Fang or Yellow Flash or Copy Nin or whatever showed up to carry the rest of the team, whatever advantage the opposing side had cooked up beforehand would just implode on itself.

It was no secret that Konoha spat out prodigies just like the Mist spat out swordsmen – they boasted the most brand-name ninja out of any village. His fellow Jonin in Suna often sneered that being famous defeated the purpose of being a ninja, but Baki liked to be realistic. That these men could become famous and _stay_ famous, even with so many people after all those heads crammed into the front pages of the Bingo Book, said quite a bit about their skill. Even better, if they never even got caught in the first place.

Baki loved his village and he loved his country, but he would never try to delude himself into thinking that an idiotic plan like the Fourth Kazekage had come up with would ever work. Even if they _did_ manage to hurt the Leaf, it would only hurt the Sand even more. And, at the moment, the Leaf was the village that had the greater ability to resist damage. They could blow up half of their buildings, and the resulting reparation costs would barely dip into their coffers.

He had respected his former leader, who was a powerful and capable shinobi by his own right, but his extremist policies had cost them dearly. The Sand was not the center of the world – none of the villages really were – but if there was one village that stood out above the rest, it would not be the Sand. Maybe Cloud, if they could ignore all of Konoha's stupid cheat code kekkei genkai and (literally) insane prodigies.

He hadn't believed it when Temari claimed that Kakashi Hatake had tried to _flirt_ with her all those months ago when they had been assigned to gate duty, but then Gaara had confirmed the answer, and what Gaara said was law as far as anyone in Suna was concerned. Except, of course, for Gaara's father, but he was dead now. Had been for quite some time, actually.

And, according to the latest reports, so was Orochimaru. That was how they had even discovered the murder in the first place, actually. Orochimaru had been impersonating the Kazekage for – who knew how long. Maybe since this entire scheme had started. Baki liked to think so, that the downright idiotic decisions that central command had been handing down for months now was simply the result of foreign infiltration and not, well, actual idiocy, but deep inside his heart he was very well aware that desperate men were wholly capable of such imbecilic trains of thought.

That the Council of Sunagakure _still_ wanted to proceed with this invasion even after all – _that_ – had happened had only solidified his belief.

"No. I refuse," Baki said, for what seemed like the hundreth time. "I supported the invasion only because I was following orders – but now that I am acting Kazekage, you _will_ listen to me, and realize that this was a stupid idea from the very beginning. Orochimaru betrayed his own village first, so why are you so surprised when our village came next? Anyway, look where he is now. Dead. And the help he promised us is useless without him at the head. Maybe we _can_ take on Konoha alone, without his army of mutants. Maybe we can't. What I do know is this: it will be costly for both of us. And why should we waste time and sweat and blood of our own men, trying to finish this half-man-half-creature's purpose, when all he has achieved is ruin for himself and for us?"

"But then what do we do about the whole money issue?"

Money. It was all about money. This whole system was a broken one.

"That is a matter with the Daimyo, not with Konoha," Baki explained. "Part of the reason why Konoha's rates are so low is because they are on good terms with their Daimyo, who funds them well. Their government subsidizes them, causing them to become a good return on investment, which only earns them more subsidies. If we could just get our Daimyo to realize the importance of having a domestic source of military power, he might just spare the extra costs. Then, in a few years' time, we could prove to him that his temporarily higher expenses really did pay off. If not, then we'll find someone else in his court who supports us, and fund him instead. It will be easier to carry out a bit of political subterfuge among civilians, than launching a full-scale invasion of what is basically another self-sufficient military base."

 _Come to think of it, that pattern of thought might be exactly why we are not on good terms with our Daimyo…_

"Sir?"

"What?"

"Um…what will we tell the other Sand forces?"

"That the invasion is called off, of course. No dying here – "

"I meant your team. Um. And the demon – er, Gaara."

Baki had no answer to that question.

* * *

 _ANBU Intelligence_

"Call from above; there's been a change in plans, Ibiki-san," Inoichi Yamanaka said, striding into the room. "The guise is over. Everyone with suspicious affiliations to Sand or Orochimaru is to be detained immediately, except for the Ichibi, which will be dealt with when Jiraiya-sama gets back to us. I don't know what the Sandaime has in store for them – right now, our focus is dismantling Orochimaru's support base before he can do whatever he normally does to keep from dying. Our main goal is trying to find out as much as we can about his secret techniques and prior activities in the process."

"Already on it," Ibiki said.

"Either dispatch squads, or try to fix the summoning-seal network, whatever – but we have to account for all of them," said Inoichi.

"Got it," Ibiki said, and turned back to his radio set. "Central T&I to all tracker squads, repeat: central T&I to all tracker squads. The snake has been temporarily beheaded. All tags, potential or confirmed, are to be reassigned to priority headquarters at your greatest convenience. Whatever you do, do not let them escape. Any good method that will lure them in is authorized. Summoning seal networks are still down." Mid-command, he paused, and then turned back to Inoichi. "Are there any plans to keep them for negotiations once the conversation is over?"

 _[Sir? What about the loose threads?]_ Team Salamander-alpha replied. _[Do we sew them back or cut them loose?]_

Inoichi shook his head.

"Cut their threads," Ibiki told him.

There was a pregnant pause, and then the radio buzzed back to life. _[Even the kids?]_

Kids? Sure, they were kids. Kids playing ninja that got caught up with the wrong leader. Yeah, but no. Their lives, rights, and free will had been forfeit the moment they put on those forehead protectors with the Sound symbol on them. Besides, they were already fourteen. Teenagers. He had known people who, at half their age, were deadlier than he was now.

There was no forgiveness in the world of shinobi. Not children, not the elderly, not people who only appeared to be civilians. Those that trusted, and trusted wrongly, ended up dead.

They were going to hell for this, but he didn't really mind because he was already going to hell. If there was even a hell to go to. Assuming that this place they called "Earth" wasn't hell already, then he could at least expect some good company when he finally ended up there. After all, Inoichi Yamanaka was a pretty decent guy. And his buddies all were, too.

Heaven was for boring people.

Of course, chances were, with his luck, the section of hell he ended up in would be just the same as home.

"Yes," he told them. "Even the kids."

His eyes met Inoichi's, and they nodded.

"It was necessary," Ibiki said.

"Yes," Inoichi agreed. "It was necessary."

And then Ibiki folded back his arms, and waited.

"So. Orochimaru, huh?" Inoichi's voice suddenly cut in, his tone dangerous. "Would you like to tell me exactly happened here?"

 _Oh, joy,_ Ibiki thought. _The only thing worse than a pissed-off superior is a pissed-off parent._ "Other than the fact that we were expecting Sand, not Orochimaru, and all the ANBU in the area responded to the best of their ability? All six of the rookies who were attacked survived. Orochimaru, on the other hand, didn't."

This seemed to placate Inoichi somewhat, but he still looked very unhappy. "So what's this about Shikaku's son almost dying?"

Ibiki winced. "He used the Kagemane to trick Orochimaru into injuring himself. Which – that might have singlehandedly saved the lives of the rookies. Well, that, and the other thirty ANBU who bought them enough time to run in the first place." _The troubling thing is we're still not sure how, despite having reviewed the tapes about thirty times…_

Inoichi shook his head. "That boy. Too smart for his own good."

"So," Ibiki grunted. "How is Shikaku?"

"He's furious, naturally. Of course, you wouldn't be able to tell, just looking at him…" Inoichi trailed off. "I'm more concerned about Hatake. After the incident, we had to inform all the Jonin sensei of the participating teams of what happened. The thing is, we couldn't seem to find Team 7's Jonin sensei."

"I don't know where Hatake is," Ibiki said. "Officially. Unofficially…"

"He was there, wasn't he," Inoichi deadpanned. "He was the guy the sealing team said took a curse seal to the shoulder, and the reason why I had to deal with a pile of liquefied brain instead of a proper corpse in the morgue."

"That was him."

"How is he?"

Ibiki shook his head. "…He's gone completely nuts."

"Oh, so he's normal, then," Inoichi quipped.

"…Yeah," Ibiki agreed, and then suddenly, they were both laughing like mad, laughing like it was the funniest thing they had ever heard since forever – which it was. They were laughing, because the only other alternative was to be scared out of their wits. Because if they actually started to admit that they cared for their comrades, outside of their use as skilled shinobi, they'd all be too goddamned terrified to do anything useful ever again.

Orochimaru was dead. But he wouldn't stay dead. Anyone who had half a brain knew this.

"Seriously, though," Inoichi finally managed to spit out, "how is he?"

Ibiki sobered up. "If you really want to know…the poor guy – he's completely incoherent. The top guys in the Sealing division are doing all that they can, but they're completely lost. Luckily, Jiraiya-sama was already headed toward Konoha, but even then, we're not sure if he'll make it."

"Damn," said Inoichi. "I hope the poor bastard makes it out alive."

"Don't we all?" Ibiki said loftily.

"I'm serious. He has _got_ to live. He just _has_ to. I've dealt with too much of his shit, just to have him quit on us just like _that_. My daughter will be heartbroken. And – I don't even want to know what Shikaku's son would get up to if he dies. He's an overly curious kid."

"Overly curious kids tend to get killed, no matter how smart they are," Ibiki said.

"Unless they're _too_ smart, in which case none of us stand a chance," Inoichi shot back.

Ibiki thought about that. The problem with smart people was that you never knew exactly how smart they were. Especially kids. They were volatile. They had too much potential, and they rarely knew what they were capable of or just how much of an effect their actions could have on the world.

Except for Shikamaru Nara. Something told Ibiki he always knew exactly what he was going to do at any given moment in time.

Which was even more worrisome.

The thing was, the kid was just too _normal_ for someone in his situation. The stories of what became of Konoha prodigies were all too common in the shinobi world. With civilians, parents who pushed their children too much too early only ever had to worry about ending up with burnouts for adults. But, of course, with ninja, you either would up with the fragile-minded at best, or guys like Orochimaru or Itachi Uchiha at worst, if you weren't careful.

Then again, Shikaku Nara might have had something to do with it. He was no idiot; he would have known the proper way to approach raising an overly special child so that he was challenged but not destroyed.

It was just that – the guy was so _lazy_ sometimes, that Ibiki wondered how he kept up with his own son. Surely a kid like that would have been able to sneak _some_ things past his own father? The man was simply an unusually smart human, not an omniscient god. He wouldn't be able to notice every single time his son pulled one over him.

Well, at least it wouldn't be anything too bad, even if he did. As far as Ibiki was concerned, the boy was relatively stable compared to his predecessors. He was a bit of a workaholic, according to Shikaku Nara, but then again, _everyone_ was a workaholic compared to him. The important thing was, the boy had been raised knowing the importance of keeping himself emotionally and psychologically balanced.

There was still that niggling feeling in the back of Ibiki's head, however. That niggling feeling that he was capable of something far darker than he let on – just like every other child prodigy that had successfully flown under the radar during their psych evaluations.

But it was not Ibiki's place to think about the matters of another man's family. All he could do at the moment was focus on the task at hand.

Late on the second day, Konoha Team 9 had arrived at the exit to the maze, after having annihilated some other group from Grass thirty meters before the final bend. Shortly afterwards, when the sun was rising on the third day, the team from the Sound sauntered in cockily – straight into Ibiki's warm and welcoming arms.

"Oi! Chunin guy! We're done with your pathetically easy test! What do you want us to do now?" the loud and stupid one – the one with the pipes in his arms – boasted. "You don't seriously expect us to waste our time waiting for the other guys to come in, do you?"

"Of course not. Right this way," Ibiki-as-random-Chunin told them politely.

"Heh heh," the stupid one laughed. "Hey…what is this place? Where are we going? We've been walking for a really long time, you know!"

"We're leaving the compound," Ibiki explained. "It's a rather large place, since this canyon is far away from the population center, so unfortunately you'll have to walk for a while longer. But at least this tunnel is indoors and air-conditioned, unlike the original dirt trail you took to get out here, right?"

"We didn't walk _this_ far getting out to this place, though," the bandaged one pointed out. "Where are you taking us, exactly?"

"Your new home for the rest of your life," Ibiki said cheerfully, pulling back the door to the interrogation cell and shoving them inside.

They broke in two hours and twenty-four minutes.

"Take them away," Ibiki ordered, and the sobbing, spineless messes that had once been human were dragged away to the execution chambers.

 _Sir,_ the intercom buzzed again. _Team Kabuto is approaching the end gate._

"I'll be right up there," Ibiki said, reapplying the Henge. "Double security on that one."

 _What about the ones still in the maze?_

"Bring them in, too."

* * *

 **A/N: Didn't get as far as I had hoped regarding Shikamaru and the rookies this chapter, as the bit with Kakashi still needed some resolution. For those of you who want to see more of him, hang tight. I promise, this whole story is Shikamaru-centric, even the parts that don't seem like it.**

 **Also – I am taking suggestions now for the names of the Next Generation kids. To avoid any spoilers, I won't be specifying any parents. (This is not a major part of the story, and they'll only appear in the epilogue. I'm just asking because I suck at naming things.)**


	17. Raising the Fighting Spirit

_The Chunin Exam Preliminaries_

Kakashi-sensei wasn't there.

That was all Ino's mind could process at the moment.

 _Kakashi-sensei wasn't there._

She wasn't even listening to the Hokage speak. Something about preliminary matches, and how the exams were a replacement for war. All she knew was that, of the five teams that had arrived at the gates before time was up – the three Konoha rookies, plus Gai-sensei's team, and the team from Sand – only four of their respective Jonin were present.

Kurenai-sensei. Asuma-sensei. Gai-sensei. And the guy from Sand.

There was an empty gap in the line where Kakashi-sensei should have been.

Ino felt her knees go weak. Naruto didn't look like he was doing too well, either. But if Shikamaru could still stand - albeit in a rather wobbly manner - while still recovering from massive chakra exhaustion, then so could they.

(He wasn't even supposed to be out of bed, technically. But he had somehow managed to bully the medics into letting him go down into the pit with his team under the condition that he didn't engage in any other physical activity.)

So she grit her teeth and made herself pretend like nothing was wrong, just like all the other candidates in the pit. When everyone attentively responded to the Hokage's speech, she responded, too. When everyone moved up to the balconies, she moved with them.

 _Just be one with the crowd. Act like everyone else. And you'll be okay._

And -

She was fine. She was fine. She was fine.

"We're going to be fine, Naruto," she said.

Naruto nodded and gave her a weak little smile.

Theirs was the only team without an adult standing behind them, and by _god_ it was obvious; they stuck out like a sore thumb.

Never before had she felt so self-conscious. Ino was a confident person by nature; _she_ was the one who set the new rules; _she_ was the one who people turned to when they wanted to know how to be popular and cool. She had felt the trials and tribulations of mood swings and little things like that, but not _actual_ social problems. Now, she felt little and lonely and lost, and for the first time in her life she sort of understood how most other people felt when they felt awkward.

She felt someone tap her shoulder, and, by default, looked to the opposite side. She was too used to Kakashi-sensei's little pranks by now. Something stupid and hopeful in her brain had actually expected Kakashi-sensei to be there – his lazy eyes and his silly smile and his singsong voice saying "Sorry I'm late!" and then spouting off some random excuse like he always did.

But there was nothing. She turned to the other side. It was just Naruto. He made a little waving motion with his hand. The Sandaime Hokage wanted to see them. To talk to them, it seemed. In private.

As soon as they had exited the room out into the hall, the Hokage asked them, "Are you three doing all right?"

"Yes," Naruto answered for them. And then, the waterfall of words came out again, and Ino didn't even bother to stop him like she normally did. "…How's Kakashi-sensei? Where is he? Why isn't he here? Is it that bad?"

The Hokage pinched the bridge of his nose and tiredly muttered something under his breath that sounded suspiciously like, _"You three weren't supposed to figure it out so easily."_

"He is fine. He had a doctor's appointment that he couldn't miss. It was a sudden thing. Don't worry about it."

Don't worry about it. _Don't worry about it._ They couldn't do anything right now _but_ worry about it. Ino stole a glance at Shikamaru. He had a weird look on his face. It was that look he got every time he was about to do something unbearably…brilliant? Brilliant, but risky. That was always Shikamaru. For all his caution on the field, regarding everyone else, he always seemed to push himself the most.

"Is he okay?" Naruto pressed.

"He is fine. We are giving him the best treatment possible," the Hokage promised them.

"But is it _enough_?" Naruto insisted. "You have to be specific about these things! We have to know, old man! That's our sensei you're talking about!"

"He will live," the Sandaime said curtly. "I promise you. He will live."

"Live? Is that it?"

The Hokage leveled them with a look. "What do you mean?"

"Well, you know, what if he lives, but he never walks again, or something? What if – "

"He will live, and he will recover to be healthy enough to return to active duty," the Sandaime told them firmly. At this, Naruto finally silenced.

 _I can't tell if he's lying or not,_ Ino thought.

"But ANBU," Ino cut in. "How come was he with them? I thought he quit. He's our Jonin sensei; he can't just _leave_ us like that – "

The Hokage looked even older than he did now. "He's not – this was no mission from me, you realize. He – is a skilled ninja, a trained infiltrator, and a former ANBU associate with easy access to a mask and uniform. It would not have been difficult for him."

"Why?" Shikamaru suddenly asked.

"It's against the rules for Jonin to become involved in any exams that their Genin students are participating in, as you know," the Sandaime explained. "But you three have learned time and time again that he is not normally one to follow the rules. He only wanted to protect you three. As for my end, I turned a blind eye to him because – well, I sympathized with his desire to protect his teammates. Besides, we could not stop the exams in the middle. Because of keeping face, you understand. There will be many foreigners present at the finals."

"That wasn't what I meant," Shikamaru said softly, and Ino could see him drawing all the right conclusions within the span of a few milliseconds. "He knew about that entire – _thing_. Or at least about Sand. Whatever. So why were we _entered_ in the first place?"

It was not a question. It was a demand. Shikamaru was demanding _answers_. Lovely. When Shikamaru demanded answers for anything, he would get those answers, regardless of whether the person he was asking actually answered them or not. He had his special little ways. Ino, as the Yamanaka in the team, was technically in charge of information gathering, not him – but at least she knew when to quit.

Shikamaru…didn't. If he wanted something, he'd figure out a way to get it, or exhaust himself trying. The idiot.

The Hokage was silent for a few seconds. "That is not something I can explain to you out in the open like this. Your father will be able to tell you, better than me."

"I see. Thank you, Hokage-sama," Shikamaru said respectfully. "Come on, guys. Let's go."

"Ino, Naruto, you feel that you are not in the right state of mind to continue testing, you may opt out," the Sandaime said gently.

Ino actually considered it – but no. She was almost ashamed of herself. After all that Kakashi-sensei had suffered through, they were just going to quit? She wanted to pass this test more than ever now. She wanted to – no, _had_ to become a Chunin. Genin were always so out of the loop. No one had ever told any of them about any of this. Maybe if they had known, they would have been more careful, and then Kakashi-sensei wouldn't be _dying_. No one told them this directly, of course, but Ino could read faces just as well as she could read minds. She believed it when the Hokage said that Kakashi-sensei was "fine" (though how "fine" she didn't know) _now_ , but from his face, she knew that he _hadn't_ been at one point.

And that had been truly terrifying – Kakashi-sensei, the incorrigible, indestructible, unfazable, human embodiment of all things chaotic – in danger of just…disappearing from life.

So she said, "No. We're going to fight. Thank you, Hokage-sama."

The Hokage gave them an odd little look, and then nodded. "Very well. The best of luck to you three." And he ushered them back into the main room.

Since Shikamaru had forfeited his right to participate as a result of his injury, he was technically supposed to leave while the rest of the team competed in the preliminary rounds. But, after some interestingly executed manipulation and guilt-tripping of the _Hokage_ , something which Ino was sure he had picked up from Kakashi-sensei (no, don't think about him now), he had been allowed to remain on the balcony as an observer.

When they re-entered the room, the first fight had already begun. Ino didn't really bother to pay much attention. She had seen Neji spar before, though she had never gone head-to-head with him personally. Kiba, a brawler by nature, without much extra technique or tactical reasoning skills, couldn't hold a candle to him, even if Akamaru was there to help him. Strength could only do so much against speed and precision.

The match ended in a matter of minutes. Ino watched almost uncaringly - strange, because she wasn't normally this apathetic to other people, even if they weren't on her team - as Neji repeatedly hit Kiba and Akamaru in a series of tenketsu strikes, before finally delivering some scathing remarks and turning away. Kiba was forced to return to the balcony with his ego bruised, but Ino knew he wasn't the type to be emotionally devastated over a few words. By tomorrow he'd be back to normal.

 _"Ino…Ino…"_

She jerked her head, annoyed.

"Fine, then. Don't talk to me."

Suddenly, as if struck by lightning, Ino jerked out of her stupor. "Wait! Who was that?" She rapidly turned her head around to see, and caught sight of Sakura's bright pink hair. "Sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to ignore you. I was distracted."

"Oh, okay," Sakura shrugged, giving Ino a critical little look. Ino couldn't really bring herself to care. She didn't even bother to protest. She knew that compared to Sakura right now, she didn't look like much. Sakura's team had been one of the first to make it through, and they had run into almost zero trouble the entire way through. The whole thing would have been cake for a tracker-genjutsu combo.

It should have been cake for Team 7, too, had they _not_ had the bad luck to run into an insane missing-nin.

Even after all that time resting at the base, she still felt completely exhausted and dirty. No one in their team had slept well in the past few days, and she could feel the rings underneath her eyes. The spare set of clothes she had brought with her were designed to be sturdy and inconspicuous, not aesthetically pleasing. And even though her hair was clean, it was still very tangled. She longed for some real shampoo and conditioner, but of course there was no time for that in the Chunin exams.

Sakura seriously did look very nice. More…confident. And happy with herself. A little annoyed with Lee, maybe, given the looks she kept throwing Gai's team at the other end of the balcony, but overall stronger and more self-assured than when she had left the Academy. _And_ she was clean and well-rested.

Ino felt just the tiniest bit jealous. In the six months that they had been apart, she had unconsciously been picking up on their sensei's – _no, don't think about that right now_ – not exactly slobbish, but minimalist habits. Without any other girls around her to compare herself to, and only Naruto and Shikamaru to "impress" (neither of whom counted; Naruto was younger than she was in both age and maturity and Shikamaru was her childhood friend/brother), she had simply let herself go. Maintaining her appearance was too troublesome given her daily activity, anyway.

"Yeah, it was probably – _this_ , huh?" Ino asked. Baggy, plain brown and green pants and sweater – she probably could be confused for a drooping piece of moss, if she just closed her eyes and pressed herself tight up against the wall. Hardly the look which she had proudly carried in her Academy days. No wonder she was unrecognizable to Sakura.

"Naruto's not orange anymore," Sakura said, trying to make some conversation.

"No, he isn't," Ino replied, not knowing what to say. Huh. That was odd. She could have sworn that just last week, she'd have been able to come up with five different conversation topics, two of them insults and one an entire full-blown argument on the fly from that sentence alone.

Sakura paused, probably expecting more. When she realized that Ino wasn't going to be saying much more than that, she tried again. "You sure you're okay?"

"Yeah, I'm sure."

"Sasuke-kun seems happier."

 _Sasuke-kun, Sasuke-kun, Sasuke-kun._ It was always all about him. Once upon a time, she would have hated Sakura for bringing it up. Once upon a time, they would have gotten into a little catfight over it.

But now, she felt nothing. She only felt empty. Sasuke-kun seemed so negligible, so far away. Her _team_ , her _sensei_ , the people she'd spend the rest of her life _dying_ for... _they_ were the ones who really mattered, and yet she couldn't do a thing to help.

"That's nice."

Sasuke-kun wasn't her teammate. Sasuke-kun wasn't dying.

Sakura frowned. "Look, Pig, I know I told you I didn't want to be your friend anymore, but Kurenai-sensei told me as long as we have these headbands on, we're still fellow shinobi, yeah?"

"Yeah."

"Pig – I mean, _Ino_ – "

"I'm fine. Honestly," Ino insisted.

"All right," said Sakura, deciding not to press any further. For which Ino was glad, until she picked an equally bad topic. "So…where's your sensei?"

"He's…late. He always is," Ino tried.

"Well, that's not very responsible, is it?"

Ino glared at her, and Sakura scurried back a few steps. Maybe in any other situation, Ino would have felt bad for being mean to her, since it really wasn't Sakura's fault for not being there.

But not now.

* * *

Hiruzen Sarutobi, once again, was left feeling extremely guilty. It was his fault that Team 7 was even in this mess in the first place. It had been necessary, and yet he was unable to tell them the whole truth. He had to prevent their disillusionment; they were already torn up enough about Kakashi's predicament as it was and another blow to their morale would only make things worse. Things like this had to be taken in slow bites. If ever.

Now they were choosing to keep fighting, and what's more, they were fighting _for_ Kakashi. _The gods of irony must be rolling on the floor by now,_ he thought. _The one person who_ doesn't _want them to pass…and they're fighting_ for _him._

If any one of them got even a stubbed toe in this thing, Kakashi would have his head.

Hiruzen eyed the youngest boy from Sand warily. He called Hayate over – the one person who hadn't been changed out in the entire Chunin Test Proctor reshuffle.

"What can you do about that boy over there?" he asked. Hayate turned to look.

"That one?" he asked.

"Yes. Him. I don't want him fighting here." Mentally unstable jinchuuriki; he didn't want him fighting _any_ of Konoha's children, _period_. To hell with this replacement for war pretense. "Get rid of the rest of the Sand team, too. They should have gone to Ibiki."

"Yes, sir," said Hayate. He straightened, coughed twice, and then announced, "Due to the lack of diversity in our final brackets, the entire team from the Hidden Sand is automatically granted a bye into the final rounds. Congratulations; you will not have to fight here. Please leave the area and return to your home base."

The smallest boy looked very angry, but he always looked angry, so the Sandaime didn't care.

The Sand Jonin, Baki, nodded, and herded the Kazekage's children down the stairs. Or, former Kazekage. His intelligence scouts had reported back to him that the Kazekage had been murdered, probably by Orochimaru, and that the director of the invasion force had been handed down to the next most senior Suna nin in the area – that is, Baki.

Though Baki didn't know it, the Sandaime Hokage was already planning the conversation that they would soon be having. Because, really, there was no way that either of them were going to be leaving this thing without entering _some_ sort of negotiation round. Preferably one that would end massively in Konoha's favor. Hiruzen was normally not a big fan of Danzo's policies, but in this case, he really did want to see Sunagakure suffer. Seeing as Orochimaru was already dead and all.

Danzo. Why did he even keep the guy around?

 _Because you let him do your dirty work instead of doing it yourself. Because you're a coward. Because you would have a willing scapegoat. Because he's still useful to you, and you take advantage of him more than he takes advantage of you. And you're surprised he wants the hat that would finally give him positive recognition for everything he's done in your stead?_

 _Shut up,_ he snapped at the little voice in his head. _Go away._

He could still see the badly fitting curse mark murdering Kakashi every time he closed his eyes. It just wouldn't leave. Hiruzen had lived a long life and seen many horrors, but it was _this_ particular memory that refused to scrub itself away for some reason. Maybe because it was a combination of both Kakashi and Orochimaru – two young men he had failed twice-over.

He looked back down at the Sand team – the young and nervous Baki, carrying the mistakes of his predecessors on his shoulders, the jinchuuriki with the terrible seal, who Naruto could have so easily turned out to be, had people like Iruka Umino not taken responsibility over him, and, for what seemed to be like the millionth time in the past month, he sighed.

This was going to be a _long_ day.

* * *

Hayate was getting a little bored. The last fight hadn't been much to watch. _Neji Hyuga vs. Kiba Inuzaka_ had basically consisted of the older boy whacking around his opponent – and a dog – until they collapsed to the ground. Watching the martial arts was cool, but there was very little strategy to be had. The obligatory pre-match trash talk hadn't been particularly creative, either.

So Hayate was hoping that this one would be mildly entertaining, at least.

And it kind of was.

"INO-CHAN! LET US MAKE THIS A MOST YOUTHFUL FIGHT!"

If loud.

* * *

"I AM SORRY, INO-CHAN, BUT MY ROMANTIC FEELINGS FOR YOU EXIST NO LONGER! I AM NOW SAKURA-CHAN'S MOST WORTHY AND YOUTHFUL SUITOR! FEAR NOT, HOWEVER, FOR YOU ARE STILL MOST BEAUTIFUL AND YOUTHFUL, AND WE CERTAINLY SHALL REMAIN THE BEST OF FRIENDS!"

Ino wanted to crawl into a corner and die. Sakura had this weird look on her face, and Ino turned away. She did _not_ want to have to explain this awkwardness.

"Start!" Hayate announced.

The first thing Ino noticed, when fighting Lee, was that it was easier than she expected. She had seen Lee and Naruto spar before, and she knew that Lee hit _hard_. Of course, this was the first time she had personally fought with Lee, because that one time they'd had Gai-sensei Training Time, she had always made excuses to try to get partnered up with Tenten, who was the least messed up of the lot. Even so, she knew that Lee was holding back.

Very obviously.

Her first instinct was to demand that he treat her like an equal, instead of that one girl he used to have a borderline-obsessive crush on. She didn't know why she was so angry; she just _was._ She just couldn't _take_ it anymore, this treading on glass behavior around her. She wanted, no, _needed,_ a good fight. Something, _anything,_ to distract her from everything that was going on right now.

However, if there was one life lesson she remembered from Kakashi-sensei (he's okay), it was, "Be _smart_ , not _dumb_."

That, and "If you're going to be _dumb_ , be _smart_ about it."

Lee was a very nice kid.

Lee was also a very dumb kid.

And if he was dumb enough to be nice to her in a fight, then he deserved the consequences.

Like her taking advantage of that niceness to punch him in the face.

"Lee! What do you think you're doing?" Tenten demanded.

"I AM SORRY, TENTEN," Lee yelled, nursing his bloody nose, "BUT GAI-SENSEI ALWAYS TAUGHT ME THAT IT IS MOST UNYOUTHFUL TO STRIKE A FAIR MAIDEN – "

"IT'S ALSO UNYOUTHFUL TO NOT TAKE YOUR OPPONENT SERIOUSLY, YOU NITWIT!" Tenten screamed back.

 _Crap, crap, crap, if Lee starts fighting properly then I'm screwed!_ "Shut up, Tenten! Let him do what he wants!"

"Don't listen to her, Lee! Fraternizing with the enemy is considered treason!"

"BUT TENTEN – !"

"SHE IS RIGHT, MY MOST YOUTHFUL STUDENT!" Gai-sensei called down. "JUST BECAUSE SHE IS A FAIR MAIDEN DOES NOT MEAN SHE IS NOT ALSO A SKILLED STUDENT OF YOUR SENSEI'S ETERNAL RIVAL!"

Lee sat up, face all bloodied from her strike, and flashed her a bright smile and a thumbs-up. "VERY WELL! I SHALL FIGHT WITH ALL THE STRENGTH OF MY YOUTH – KONOHA'S GREAT GREEN BEAST-IN-TRAINING SHALL ADVANCE WITH ALL THE FERVOR OF – "

"What the hell is wrong with your _team_?" Ino asked.

Tenten shrugged.

That was all she got, before Lee disappeared in a blur of green.

 _Holy shit; he's fast._ Ino thought, as she barely blocked another kick from Lee. _But as long as I'm here, I might as well fight to the best of my ability, too._

She would _not_ lose to Lee, not here. Lee was a very good fighter, and he was definitely stronger and faster than she was. There was no way she could match him in either raw muscle or speed. So, Ino did the next best thing.

She ran.

"WAIT! BUT MY LOVELY INO-CHAN, WHERE ARE YOU GOING?!"

But Ino didn't _just_ run. What she lacked in raw power, she could make up for in other ways. For one, intelligence. She was not Shikamaru, but compared to Lee, who was a genius of hard work and pretty much nothing else, she could manage.

More importantly, she could use ninjutsu and genjutsu. And Lee could not.

Sucker.

Yeah, it was cheap of her to take advantage of Lee in that way, but she was a _shinobi_. It was practically a _given_ that you didn't fight fair. And, in all honesty, it would be pretty embarrassing if she _didn't_ take advantage of such a glaring flaw when she saw it. An enemy shinobi wasn't going to refrain from using ninjutsu and genjutsu just because Lee couldn't.

Ino knew that her knowledge of genjutsu was rather limited. She had been more focused on shaping her elemental ninjutsu and her mind arts training with her father. But the few she _did_ know were infinitely more than Lee, who knew _zero_. And, in this manner, as long as she was always one step ahead, she'd be able to beat Lee.

The one she selected was simple enough – a minor disorienting genjutsu that reversed the victim's perceptions of depth and direction. It was not very chakra-intensive and in all honesty it would be easy enough for even Lee to break (the "Kai!" command did not require any actual shaping of chakra) after a few seconds. But Ino could use that to her advantage, because every time this particular genjutsu was reapplied, depth and direction were altered in a different way. Meaning, every time Lee broke through the genjutsu, she could simply reapply it over and over again until he keeled over from dizziness.

His speed and strength meant nothing if he was facing the wrong direction.

Of course, Ino knew that if he ever managed to get out of her genjutsu, one hit would probably end her. So she just kept spamming her illusions while Lee was down. Crude, but effective. Just like Naruto's army of clones. Eventually, he'd fall over, and then she'd be able to take him down with a minor fire jutsu from a distance. Nothing too dangerous – just enough to knock him out, but not enough to cause any permanent scars or heavy burning.

"LEE!" Gai-sensei suddenly yelled. "TAKE THEM OFF!"

Lee paused, and then asked (still facing in the wrong direction), " _Now,_ Gai-sensei?"

"YES!" Gai-sensei bellowed. " _NOW!_ "

Lee's face broke out into a wide grin. "YES, SIR!" He stopped everything that he was doing and reached down to his shins, to…

…peel off his leg warmers?

Whatever he was doing, it was taking _forever_.

 _Are you serious?_ Ino thought. _Oh, you have_ got _to be kidding me._

And she hit him point-blank in the face with her blasting jutsu.

"…"

"…"

"…"

"That was most unyouthful, Ino-chan," Lee moaned, and rolled over, unconscious, his massive eyebrows and ash-blackened face still smoking comically.

"Winner, Ino," Hayate declared.

Gai-sensei shook his head disappointedly. "But I would have expected nothing less from an honored student of my Eternal Rival!" Ino couldn't help but grin as the man jumped down from the railing to wake Lee up and lead him back to the balcony.

"…AND THAT IS WHY, LEE, YOU MUST ALWAYS BE MOST VIGILANT AT ALL TIMES! LETTING YOUR GUARD DOWN AS YOU PREPARE YOUR ATTACKS IS MOST UNYOUTHFUL! DO YOU UNDERSTAND?"

"YES! I UNDERSTAND! THANK YOU, GAI-SENSEI!"

"LEE!"

"GAI-SENSEI!"

"LEE!"

"GAI-SENSEI!"

"LEE!"

"GAI-SENSEI!"

"Where the hell do all those rainbows even come from?" Tenten groaned.

"You're asking _me_?" Ino replied.

"I take it you're feeling better?" Shikamaru smiled at her from where he was sitting on the ground. Ino smiled back.

"Oh, loads."

* * *

BONUS #11

 _In an Alternate Universe_

"LEE!" Gai-sensei suddenly yelled. "TAKE THEM OFF!"

Lee paused, and then asked (still facing in the wrong direction), " _Now,_ Gai-sensei?"

"YES!" Gai-sensei bellowed. " _NOW!_ "

 _Take what off?_

Lee's face broke out into a wide grin. "YES, SIR!" He stopped everything that he was doing and reached down to his shins, to…

 _Oh, god._

 _He's taking off his leg warmers._

 _What else is he going to take off?_

 _Oh, no. No no NONONO. I am NOT watching that._

"SECRET NINJA ART!"

"Wait, Ino, it's not _that_ , it's just the weights - " Tenten yelled, but it was too late.

"KATON: KILL IT WITH FIRE!"

The end.

* * *

 **A/N: Sorry, Lee fans. He's an awesome fighter, but honor gets the best of him. :) If it's any consolation, the Chunin exams is by no means the final authority on strength.**

 **On another note, what is the** **most ridiculously lame animal you can think of?**


	18. Of Onions and Tears

_The Chunin Exam Preliminaries_

"Next up - Hinata Hyuga - "

Hinata gulped.

" - versus Tenten. Please, come down to the front."

Nervously, she descended the steps. Hinata did not want to disappoint. She already got enough hell from her father for being a failure at home. When they were attacked by the snake in the maze, she had to wait for Team 7 to come and save her. Sasuke, her own teammate, treated her like dead weight – justified, in that she really didn't do anything that useful most of the time. Asuma-sensei and Choji were at a loss at how to deal with her, too. Oh, they never _said_ anything, but she could _tell._ Every time they told her to try harder...that just meant she was weak.

And she didn't even want to think of Naruto, who wouldn't even notice her back in the Academy, seeing her lose here.

All her life she had been regarded as powerless, so much that even she felt like believing it. Hinata couldn't understand why it was her, and just her, who could never seem to go anywhere in life. All the people here seemed to be so strong – even the other girls and the rest of the rookies, so she had no excuse there. Neji had been cruel to his opponent during their fight, but there was no doubt that he was good at what he did. He had easily run circles around Kiba, and Hinata knew that Kiba was stronger than she was.

And then Ino had managed to defeat Lee, and Hinata had seen Lee fight Sasuke before the exams. Lee had wiped the floor with him, and Sasuke could wipe the floor with _her_. Of course, Hinata didn't know if Ino could beat Lee in a taijutsu-only fight, or if Lee could have finished off her teammate if he had been unwilling to use fire jutsu indoors (he was strangely considerate in certain regards, and not setting wooden buildings on fire with his breath was one of them). But the point was, she _had_ beaten him, and that was all that mattered. Ino would be advancing to the finals, and Lee would not.

Sakura hadn't fought yet, but if her team had made it here so early then she _must_ have been strong as well.

And then, Tenten. Standing in front of her. She was Neji's teammate, and she didn't seem like she was going to give in, either, just because Hinata was younger and less experienced. On the contrary, Tenten looked like she was going to use it to her advantage, and maybe even make it worse for her, because she had probably already known Neji for a while, and she would know that he was a strong person to be taken seriously. Maybe she would regard Hinata with the same wariness. Something that Hinata didn't really deserve; she knew she would never catch up to Neji.

Nonetheless, she had to try.

Although, admittedly, she didn't try very hard.

After the first few strikes, it was clear that she couldn't beat Tenten. Tenten was stronger and faster than she was, and besides, she was used to defending against the Gentle Fist. She was Neji's teammate; thus she had probably sparred with Neji many times in the past. She knew all the standard points Hinata was taught to strike; she knew all the counters to the various stances.

Most importantly, she understood that the Gentle Fist was a short-range collection of techniques. Every single time Hinata saw an opening and went for it, Tenten would just move backwards, out of the way. And then, when she got too far away for Hinata to reach, she started throwing her weapons – and all of a sudden Hinata was on the defensive, trying to dodge and slap away the barrage of kunai and shuriken raining down upon her.

Tenten had amazing skill in judging distances, probably as a result of her extensive weapons training. She knew exactly where to stand to optimize her own range of damage while at the same time just barely staying out of Hinata's way.

It was the part that Hinata had always had the most trouble with – getting close to people. When others dodged, and she couldn't reach, she was admonished for not being skilled enough to strike them down. And when she tried to defend herself by getting out of range instead of blocking – which was very highly logical in her opinion – she was admonished again, for being cowardly, for being too passive, for being lazy, for not attacking.

No matter what she did, she was never good enough.

She…couldn't do it.

Her father was right. Neji was right. And, even though Sasuke never said it out loud, he was right every time he looked at her with those condescending eyes. He wasn't looking at her like that right now, but she was sure he was still judging her. She was weak. She was a loser. As she fell, she looked up and caught a glimpse of Naruto.

Only, he wasn't even looking at her. He and Ino and Shikamaru had their heads bowed together – they were sitting in their own little circle, talking about something. Maybe it was her – they were talking about how quick and pathetic that fight had been, how she was such a loser. Or maybe they didn't even regard her as important enough to discuss. They were talking to each other, not even sparing her a glance. She wasn't important enough to join their private little circle. They were in their own little world.

Ino and Naruto seemed more serious now, with their dark clothes and solemn faces and determined eyes – but there was still that tiniest spark of cheery self-confidence and mischief present around Naruto, for which she was glad. It seemed less pronounced than before, however, and that was what made Hinata worry. She didn't want to see him lose that spark altogether. Naruto would no longer be himself if that happened.

Sasuke had improved in leaps and bounds under Asuma-sensei's tutelage. Choji, too, was advancing extremely quickly; his family's special jutsu made him stronger than most people could dream of being. Kiba had lost to Neji, but he was so much stronger and faster than when she had seen him last. Sakura and Shino hadn't fought yet, but from the way they carried themselves, they seemed so much better than she was.

Something had happened between their graduation and now, but they had all changed so much. Everyone. Everyone except her. Hinata was still stuck in the same little rut she had always been in, and nothing she ever did was going to get her out of that.

"Tenten, winner."

 _I can't do it. I'm a failure._

She tried to hold back the tears in her eyes as she ascended the stairs again. Everyone was quietly staring at her. Staring at her and judging her, just like her father did. Neji, with that look of disgust. The others, with their looks of pity. No one talked to her. No one said anything to her.

No one except for the person she had just fought.

"Hey! Hinata, right? Can I talk to you? Outside?"

Hinata looked up. Tenten was in front of her face. Over to the side, Neji was still glaring at her.

 _What is she going to do? Mock me? Make fun of me? Rub it in my face?_

 _I'd deserve it. That match really_ was _pathetic._

The next fight had begun. Sakura Haruno had been called up…to face Sasuke Uchiha. Hinata felt really bad for her. If she had been put in the same situation…She didn't think she'd be able to even lift a finger to fight Naruto. At least with Tenten, she had tried. A little.

But as soon as Hayate-san had given the start signal, Sakura had bravely jumped into the fray, and was now resisting with all her might. The way she looked at Sasuke, you could tell that she still admired him, but that didn't mean she was just going to bend over and hand him the spot in the finals. Hinata wished she could be like Sakura.

 _"Hn. You've gotten better."_

If only Naruto-kun would acknowledge her like that.

 _"I'm a ninja, too, Sasuke! Outside of these exams are a different story, but while we're here…!"_

Sasuke smirked at her, and Sakura smiled back at him, before pulling out a kunai and charging.

 _"Watch me, Kurenai-sensei! I'll make you proud!"_

She was so brave. Even if she lost here, she would still be so brave in Hinata's eyes. Sasuke was a very strong ninja. Being able to stand up for him as long as Sakura had already was a feat that Hinata could only ever dream of.

"Ummm…sure?" Hinata really didn't want to miss the fight, but Tenten looked impatient.

Almost immediately after they had left the room, Tenten cornered her. Hinata bit back a shriek, hoping that Tenten wasn't here to finish what she had started.

"Why'd you let me win?" Tenten demanded.

"…W-What?"

"Why'd you let me win?" she asked again. "You're Neji's cousin. There's no way you should have lost so easily."

Hinata let her head drop. "But I'm not Neji."

"Doesn't matter," Tenten snapped. "I know you were holding back, back there. All of your hits were pretty much on point. You dodged all of my weapons and you smacked them away all perfectly. You weren't making any mistakes. I was about to pull out my Twin Dragon scrolls on you, actually. And then you just let your arms drop to your sides, and you took that hammer right to the head! You didn't even _try_ to block it!"

Tenten was angry at her for losing. That was another person to add to the list, she supposed.

"…I mean, Lee was taking Ino seriously during their fight! Why didn't you take me seriously? If you had tried to block and missed, or turned the wrong way, I might have believed you, but you didn't even mess up _once_! Not _once_! You just – quit!" Tenten was still ranting at her. "Why? You didn't even try to fight; you just tossed the victory right into my lap! Not that I don't appreciate you saving me the trouble, but why would you do that? Am I not good enough for you to take seriously? Why?"

"I'm sorry. I know I'm weak," Hinata mumbled in apology, more out of habit than anything else..

"What are you talking about?" Tenten asked. "Hey, are you even listening to me?"

"Yes…"

Tenten put her hands on her hips and glared at her. Hinata shrunk in apology. The older girl had won, but she still hated her for it. _I can't even lose properly._

"For god's sake, don't pull that crap on me, girl. I _know_ you're not weak. Why are you pretending that you are? Is there some reason you don't want to advance? I want to know," Tenten pressed.

"I'm sorry – " _Wait, what?_

Tenten raised an eyebrow. "For what? I'm not asking you to say sorry. I just want to know why you did what you did back there – "

"I didn't hear you," Hinata said quickly. "What did you say before?"

"I want to know why you let me win."

"No, I mean – before that – "

"You mean that stuff about pretending you're weak?"

There was a loud cheer, and Hayate-san's voice called, _"Sasuke Uchiha, winner."_

She heard everyone clapping. For both Sasuke and Sakura. They had admired her fight, too. Not like her. She was boring. No one paid any attention to her.

 _"Aw, man, that was a really good fight!"_ she heard Lee exclaim.

 _"Yeah, Sakura-chan sure gave Sasuke-teme a run for his money!"_ Naruto said.

Choji agreed with him. _"She was actually really good. Too bad she got Sasuke for her opponent, though. If it had been anyone else, her genjutsu would have kicked their butt."_

 _"Yeah, the Sharingan really isn't fair, is it?"_

 _"Next match!"_ Hayate-san called. _"Choji Akimichi vs. Naruto Uzumaki! This means that Shino Aburame will be getting a bye this round. We will see you in the finals, Shino. Congratulations."_

"Hinata! Pay attention when I'm talking to you!" Tenten said, snapping her fingers around Hinata's head. "Why are you pretending you're weak?"

Hinata sighed in defeat. "I'm not pretending, Tenten. I just _am._ Please, let me go back inside – "

But the older girl blocked her way, slamming her palm against the wall before Hinata could worm around her. "Is that really it? You really _do_ think you're that weak? That's why you gave up? Not because you were going easy on me or something?"

Hinata nodded shamefully.

Tenten snorted. "Well, if that's the case, then that's sadder than a depressed onion cutting itself."

Hinata felt the tears build up in her eyes. "I know."

"Are you crying?" Tenten stared at her. "Oh, god, you're crying. You're seriously _crying._ "

"I'm sorry," Hinata whispered.

"No! Stop apologizing, dammit! That wasn't supposed to be an insult; that was supposed to be a joke! It was supposed to be _funny_!" Tenten grabbed her head and groaned dramatically. "Come _on_! I worked so _hard_ on that line! 'A depressed onion cutting itself' - don't you see how that's so many layers of funny? Do you know how long I've been wanting to _say_ that? Of my three teammates, two of them are demented, oversized frogs and one of them wouldn't know what a sense of humor was if it danced in front of him in a bikini seashell swimsuit!"

Well, that was a creative way to refer to her cousin…

Tenten continued to gesticulate wildly. "And here I am, finally meeting someone who might _appreciate_ that humor, and I end up making her cry instead! I'm cursed. I must be cursed."

That…

Hinata had no idea how to respond to that, but she no longer felt like crying, that was for sure. She opted for an incredulous stare instead.

Tenten shook her head. "Why the heck are you even here, Hinata?"

Before Hinata could answer, they were interrupted with Naruto's scream of _"FUUTON: WIND CYCLONE!"_ There was a ripple in the air, and suddenly, the entire building was trembling in its foundations as the force of Naruto's ninjutsu ripped it apart from the inside. From the crack in the door, Hinata could see everyone on the balconies holding on for dear life before they got blown away into the wall.

 _"MULTI-SIZE JUTSU!"_

 _"SHADOW CLONES, ASSEMBLE! WIND STYLE: GIANT WIND SCYTHE!"_

It took all of Hinata's will to tear her eyes away from the fight back to Tenten.

"Well?" Tenten asked, prodding her in the chest. "Why the heck are you even here?"

To her mortification, she had no response to that. "I…I don't know."

"How about an easier question, then: Why do you want to become a shinobi?"

"I…I don't know, either," she confessed. "I'm sorry."

"No you're _not_ , Hinata. You're a shinobi for a _reason_. So stop thinking you're so _weak_. If you really _were_ that way, they wouldn't have given you the hitai-ate in the first place." Tenten flicked the metal on her forehead protector, to make her point. "We all have a purpose, Hinata. You're just having trouble finding yours."

 _"Winner, Naruto Uzumaki. And this concludes our rounds. Winners of previous rounds, please make your way down to the floor."_

Tenten turned away to heed the call, but not before she craned her neck back at Hinata and said, "You _are_ strong, Hinata. You just have no direction. Go home and think about it, Hinata, and don't start training again until you can answer this question truthfully: what the heck are you fighting for?"

Hinata watched her leave, but not really. Her mind was still stuck on everything Tenten had said to her.

 _Someone thinks I'm…strong?_

* * *

 _UDC (Underground Detainment Complex)_

 _Interrogation Wing, Cell #19: Kabuto Yakushi_

"So you're not directly affiliated with Sand. You're affiliated with _Orochimaru_ , who is _working_ with Sand. Is this correct?"

There was a whimper, and Ibiki rolled his eyes. He signaled to one of the other interrogators in the room, who held up a pair of rounded glasses in front of their restrained victim. In his other hand, he had a tiny screwdriver. Slowly, he began to work at the little knob on the arms. The frame started to pop open, and the lens came loose.

The victim leaned forward in the chair, screaming, "NO! _DON'T!_ "

"Answer my question, or else we will take apart this thing and grind it down to sand before your eyes. _Are you working with Orochimaru?_ "

"Yes, yes, now please stop, _please_ – "

Ibiki ignored him, and continued barraging him with questions. The pair of glasses remained loose, but so far undamaged. "And you say that as long as you have some DNA, you can revive them. And that this DNA has been hidden within all of Orochimaru's victims, but that most of the samples are in his secret base in Sound," Ibiki confirmed, ignoring his pleas.

And it went on like that. Every time the prisoner looked like he was about to balk, his precious glasses came under scrutiny. It was interesting, to Ibiki, the sorts of things that mattered to people. Shinobi were trained so very well in resisting physical pain. Their psyches, on the other hand, were less well-protected.

All of this – it was all in his head. The glasses themselves had little value other than an optical tool, and he could easily get himself new ones, better ones. Their sentimental value, however, was something the boy could not seem to let go of.

This was fully understandable to Ibiki. Objects were powerful because of the human brain's ability to associate them with more powerful, meaningful memories. He was not a completely unsympathetic person, as many other torturers – ahem, _interrogators_ – were. Rather, he understood all too well. It was this ability to pick out just exactly what people cared about, and not just the fact that he held nearly no guilt over using those things against them, that made him such a successful interrogator.

"Yes. Yes, that's right. Please, _please_ – _stop it_ – "

Ibiki sighed, and finally decided to acquiese to his request. "Nono-san would have been proud of you – whoever you are at the moment. You know she still loved you very much. She would have died for you."

Kabuto was sobbing. "BUT I DON'T _KNOW_ WHO I AM!"

 _And now you'll never know,_ Ibiki thought, semi-sadly, but not really, because the kid, while being just that – nothing more than a misguided, lost little kid – was still an enemy of Konoha, and therefore he had to be eliminated. Even more so, because of his vast and highly dangerous medical knowledge. It wouldn't do spend so much time finding and killing someone, only to have them revived like nothing had ever happened.

Now, Ibiki was very aware that Orochimaru most likely had some other secret plans that didn't completely rely on his latest victim, but from the intelligence he had gathered from all the Sound people they had rounded up, it seemed like Kabuto was still one of the more important ones. Without Kabuto, Orochimaru would definitely have a much harder time trying to come back to life. And every single backup they thwarted was another second they bought.

In the world of shinobi, one second was a lot of time. One second was the difference between life or death. One death was the difference between victory or defeat.

"Dispatch Team 2. Over."

 _Affirmative._

"And bring a chemical waste disposal team down here with you, too. Sodium hydroxide is a bitch to clean up."

 _Yes, sir._

Ibiki then stoically watched as Kabuto's dead body was taken away to the incinerator while the entire area was scrubbed down for any traces of himself he might have left behind. Strong acids and bases did wonders to breaking down DNA. Good luck cloning this guy back to life, now.

 _Need someone deleted off the face of the earth? Just contact Konoha ANBU T &I! Only one of many services we offer!_

The boy had been well-trained; that was for sure. As expected of a former Konoha ROOT ANBU now disguised as a hapless Genin. He hadn't cracked even a tiny bit for the first few hours Ibiki had had him. It was only when he brought up his deceased mother figure that Kabuto had finally snapped – and quite spectacularly, too.

Sometimes, it was the little memories you had to watch out for.

He'd have to thank Inoichi later for managing to scrounge up that data on the orphanage that Kabuto had come from. Inoichi never told him where he got it, though. Oh, well. He wasn't going to ask. As long as his methods worked, he didn't care how they were implemented. There were a lot of blind eyes turned, in their world. Ibiki had several himself.

Inoichi Yamanaka had his agenda; it lined up with Ibiki Morino's. Therefore it followed that Ibiki Morino and Inoichi Yamanaka would work together. Simple as that.

* * *

 _The Yamanaka Clan Compound_

"Oh, _god_ ," Inoichi whispered. "If Danzo ever finds out, he's going to _kill_ me."

"Don't let him find out, then," said Shikaku. "He's already trying to kill us, isn't he? One more slight against him isn't going to change his mind. Unless you were monumentally careless in your snooping – in which case you would have already killed yourself like they taught you in ANBU, to prevent the information from being tortured out of you – you should really stop pulling out your own hair, because that's not going to help Ino or Shikamaru. Or their teammates and friends."

"But do you _know_ what they made them _do_?" Inoichi asked, voice rising, and Shikaku had to stand up to calm him down before something bad happened. You never knew what privacy seals might malfunction at the exact inopportune time. "What they probably _still_ make them _do_?"

"No, but seeing your freaked-out reaction, I'm pretty glad I don't. And I'm _very_ glad Shikamaru doesn't know, either," Shikaku said, mind racing at just what exactly could make his friend, a man who often worked alongside Ibiki Morino because of his specialty, lose his composure like so. Oh, Inoichi tended get emotional a lot – he'd once gone into overdrive when Ino was two and was first learning how to walk (and fall over) – but those cases were always superficial. Silly, just like their causes. _This_ meltdown, however… _this_ was serious.

An emotional Inoichi was an unstable one, and an unstable Inoichi was a dangerous one.

"I should have never let them take Fuu away. I should have just spat in his face and taken the consequences. I should have…" Inoichi shook his head. "I changed my mind. I don't think we should kill Danzo."

"No?"

"Death is too kind for that bastard, Shikaku. I'm not going to fight him. I want to make him _suffer_."

"Or we could _not_ , but do go on," Shikaku muttered, but Inoichi wasn't listening.

"You know that eternal Genin guy, Kabuto? We had to kill him today. I was having so much fun running betting pools with the other Jonin on just how long he was going to take to _finally_ make Chunin and now that will never happen because _we_ had to _kill_ him. We had to kill him, because of Danzo, because of Orochimaru, because of all these shitty chess players playing shitty chess with the lives of other people."

Shikaku sighed. "You're _talking_ to one of those chess players, Inoichi."

"Yes, I know, but you're not a _shitty_ chess player, and that makes all the difference."

"Does it?"

"…No, not really."

No, for all they did to fight those men, they weren't so different themselves. Sometimes, Shikaku wondered why he and Danzo Shimura hated each other so much. In another world, they might have even gotten along.

And yet, Shikaku still fought for his own side. It was a simple matter of interest, after all, and the methods, no matter how similar, wouldn't matter, if the interests didn't coincide.

But maybe that was why they hated each other. After all, men tended to hate those who were most like themselves, for they were a reflection of their own faults. Shikaku blamed Danzo for a lot of things, but if he was going to be truthful with himself, he would have done the same, if it meant keeping his family alive. As for Danzo Shimura, well, he worked for "the greater good of Konoha". Except that, he neglected to consider the people _in_ Konoha as a part of it.

And then there was the Sandaime, who needed both the clans and Danzo around. The Sandaime was the biggest obstacle to their elimination of Danzo, no matter how much he pretended otherwise. To make a move against Danzo was to go against the Hokage, and that would not do, because, well, _treason_. For all his faults, there were few others in the village more fit for the position than Hiruzen Sarutobi. Were the Sandaime to step down right now, it would be a toss-up as to whether the next one would befriend the clans or be Danzo himself.

The three of them really weren't so different. Except for, of course, the whole deal with the child soldiers. This was the one thing that separated them, the one thing they used as an excuse to put themselves on a pedestal higher than his and rain judgment down on everyone else below. And when you thought about it in that way, it was pretty damn funny, to be honest.

* * *

 _The Chunin Exam Preliminaries_

"Because the final round will be in a single-elimination bracket format, we need eight people. Six of you are currently here; that means two of you who lost in the preliminaries will actually get to compete in the final rounds anyway. Based on your performances, as well as the performances of those you went up against: Sakura Haruno and Rock Lee, please join the winners on the floor."

"YOSH! THE POWER OF YOUTH HAS PREVAILED! WATCH ME, GAI-SENSEI! I SHALL PERFORM WITH ALL THE VIGOR OF YOUTH AND – "

"Wait," Shikamaru tried to ask, "what about the Sand kids? There were three of them – "

"FOR THE FINAL ROUNDS," Hayate announced over Lee, "you will be drawing numbered slips of paper from a hat to randomly decide who you will go up against in the finals, one month from now."

Naruto drew an eight. He groaned. "Ugh. Last again!"

Then Neji. Two.

Tenten, seven.

Ino, three.

Lee, six.

Sakura, one.

Sasuke, five.

Which left Shino with four.

"Excellent," Hayate announced. "The final matches will be as follows: _Sakura Haruno vs. Neji Hyuga,_ for match one, _Ino Yamanaka vs. Shino Aburame_ , for match two, _Sasuke Uchiha vs. Rock Lee,_ for match three, and _Tenten vs. Naruto Uzumaki,_ for match four. You are dismissed to all of your respective sensei until further notice."

"Wait, what about the Sand guys?" Naruto asked.

"Don't worry about them," Hayate said.

"Will they be competing, though?"

"Like I said, don't worry about them."

Ino, though, wasn't really thinking about any of that. Her mind had stopped at _Ino Yamanaka vs. Shino Aburame._.

Shino Aburame, as in the bugs guy.

Bugs.

Insects.

Kikaichu.

Beetle things that could suck your chakra dry.

All the way home, that was all she could think of.

(That, and Kakashi-sensei.)

She screamed.

* * *

BONUS #12

 _Kabuto_

Commentary posted on forum.

* * *

 **A/N: For those of you hoping to see Naruto fight, sorry to disappoint. But let's face it - the kid's OP; we all knew he was going to curbstomp whoever went up against him. And I didn't want two straight chapters of Team 7 being sad about Kakashi, so...fresh change of perspective.**

 **I was debating on whether to use Hinata or Sakura. I ultimately picked Hinata because her character development might be *cough* important *cough* soon. Creds to Bo Burnham for Tenten's onion joke.**

 **Sakura will have her moments, too, but not yet.**

 **I'll return to Shikamaru and Kakashi next chapter, I promise.**


	19. A Most Dignified Robbery

**A/N: Bonus 13 is on the forum. fanfiction [dotnet] /** **forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/**

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

I wasn't sure how many hours I had spent just lying in bed, staring at the ceiling. Too many; that was for sure.

I felt like I was missing out on something important.

It wasn't just the fact that I wasn't allowed to train. I had been prepared for _that_ unfortunate necessity. Every shinobi and their mother knew trying to overexert a chakra network while it was still in recovery mode just meant confining oneself to a longer recovery period.

There were many other productive ways I could spend my time aside from training. Like digging up information.

Unless no information was coming up. Like now.

I had no answers, just more questions.

It wasn't the matter of the foreign villages. That was easy enough to deduce. Orochimaru wasn't the type to share power so readily; his subordinates were probably falling apart quickly without him around. Sunagakure would still stand, because invading a desert just for revenge was absolute idiocy, but they would experience a severe drop in power, relegated to the same corner Kirigakure was in. At least, temporarily. Both Suna and Kiri were still dangerous, and even more so if they were in a position for people to forget about them. (That was the point of being a ninja – to be so invisible that you became forgotten, and then strike when people least expected it.) I didn't know exactly what would happen to the Genin dismissed from the exams, but I'd find out soon enough, seeing as the same thing would probably happen to every Sand nin still in Konoha.

Meanwhile, a power triangle would form between the remaining three of the five major ninja villages, then. Iwa, Kumo, and Konoha. Within those three, the relationships just got more complicated. Iwa and Konoha hated each other; Konoha could not trust Kumo; Iwa and Kumo _might_ form some secret alliance against Konoha, or they might not because no one really trusted Kumo.

If the Sandaime didn't play his cards right and somehow ruin any potential alliances between Kumo and Iwa, we might very well be fighting a two-front war sometime in the near future.

But I didn't care about that. It was obvious that all the various ninja villages hated each other, what with the ever-present scramble for more wealth and power. Konoha herself would be fine; she was the first to stand and she would be the last to fall.

I was not worried about Konoha. I was worried about the people _in_ it. Because here, my opponents were not so easily visible. Secret plotters disguised as comrades, harmful orders under the veil of service, dangerous positions hidden behind a mask of prestige and honor. _This_ was what we were supposed to trust blindly. What we were supposed to die for.

It was as if the village and the people running it were two separate entities. What was Konoha, even? Who was really in charge? What intentions did they have for my friends, for _me_? Perhaps everyday ninja could just stand around doing their work, closing their eyes and ears to everything that was above their clearance level, but I certainly couldn't.

That was always my greatest weakness. I always _had_ to know everything. I'd go mad, if I was stuck knowing that there was something I didn't know.

Some could argue that this was insubordination, this questioning of orders. But what sort of ninja would I be, if I didn't look out for myself? Shinobi rule number I-don't-care: know your mission. Not just the task, but the reasoning, the background, and the justification behind it as well.

If there was no time for them to explain at the moment, say, in an emergency, where orders had to be given and executed quickly, then fine. But I would expect an explanation after it was all over. This was a simple matter of survival. One day, the orders would become more difficult, more dangerous, and then where would I be? It was unreasonable, for them to expect such sacrifices from me, without giving me proper payment in return.

This wasn't the same as a field mission, where information was withheld so captured operatives wouldn't succumb to foreign interrogators.

This was my _own village_ , and I didn't even know if my sensei was dead or alive.

My thoughts were interrupted by my father's shadow falling across the room. "It's two in the morning, Shikamaru."

Of course _he_ would notice I was awake.

"I can't sleep," I whined.

My dad groaned. "You know your mother told you to go to bed hours ago."

"I _am_ in bed."

"'Bed' implies 'sleep'," my father grumbled.

"Don't you like ignoring her orders, though?" I grinned.

He laughed. "Not when it involves her giving me permission to sleep."

"Dad," I asked, all pretense gone, "What was the _real_ reason for entering all the rookies into the exams?"

My father immediately frowned. "Go to sleep, Shikamaru."

I was furious. _We nearly got_ killed _because of this...don't they owe me an explanation?_

But the anger disappeared as quickly as it came, replaced with something darker and uglier.

 _No, they don't. The world owes you nothing._

You cannot imagine, how crushing this realization was for me. How helpless and insignificant I was in the grand scheme of things.

It is one thing to lose a fight, because one can always train to get stronger. It is another thing entirely, to suddenly recognize the awful truth of just how little control one has over his _own_ life, no matter how strong he becomes.

"Are you angry, Shikamaru?" my father asked, staring straight at me.

I _was_ angry, but he used the present tense, so I just truthfully shook my head at him.

He looked at me a little while longer, and then he turned out the light and left.

And again, I was left in the dark.

Lucky, then, that I did not fear the shadows. I would not give up so easily. It was true, that learning how to spit fire would bring me no closer to my goal than I was now. But there were other forms of _power_ besides muscle and jutsu, and just because I had none of it now didn't mean things would remain that way.

All of it, of course, was for the safety of the people I cared about.

Or so I told myself.

* * *

 _The Sunagakure Temporary Base_

"You can't do this, Baki!" Temari yelled. "You can't just _give him away_ like that!"

"I can, and I will," Baki sighed tiredly, having come back from an extremely exhausting meeting with the Sandaime Hokage and not really wanting to argue with yet _another_ person. "Better one person than an entire village."

Baki was a shinobi, not a debater; he _followed_ orders, not questioned them. Temari was much better than he was in that regard, being a teenaged girl who had also happened to grow up under the watchful eye of the whole Sunagakure council. For all his faults, the former Kazekage had really cared about his children (well, one could make a case against Gaara, but he had been a reasonable enough father to the other two), and he had allowed her, as the eldest, to act as the head of household while he was gone.

Forceful personality, semi-manipulative at the best of times, and often presented a cool and careless front. Typical oldest sibling behavior.

"All his life, he's been a sacrifice," Temari argued. "You're just going to hand him over like that? Not even without a fight?"

 _You didn't even care if he lived or died yesterday._ "They'd crush us otherwise," Baki explained. "They knew about this invasion the whole time, Temari. They purposely let us come here with the intention of pulling something like this. Tell me, Temari: what was I supposed to do? Their Hokage practically demanded Gaara as a hostage. I was in no position to refuse."

"Couldn't we still _fight_? We're prepared – we can still deal lots of damage – "

She was young; she didn't understand. Baki didn't know how to make her understand. It was hard, admitting your own weakness. Especially in front of your former Kazekage's daughter. Every one of the Five Great Hidden Villages taught their children that their village alone stood out as the greatest and strongest; for a while that had been acceptable because they were all supposed to be around equal in terms of industrial power and military strength. But times were changing. Loyalties were shifting. Power plays were upsetting the balance.

And the Sand was on the losing side. If only _their_ Sandaime Kazekage was still alive; he'd be able to match old Sarutobi. Not like him. Baki knew his own shortcomings. He was a skilled ninja, but he was never Kage material.

Baki was not a heartless man. He would, under no circumstances, send anyone out on a suicide mission. He would _accept_ one, if his leaders gave the order. But he was the leader now, and his style was much different from that of his predecessors. Gone were the days of ruthless politicking; Baki had been out in the field himself numerous times and knew how terrible it could be for those actually executing the plans. He would not suffer someone else to the same fates he had already experienced - barely survived.

"One of their missing-nin managed to murder the most powerful man in our village. Now one of their men has managed to defeat Orochimaru. They outnumber us greatly, and while individually their men are weaker than ours, they know how to gang up on the enemy like wolves. Even if we manage to hurt them, we will come out of this with dead men, too."

"Sheesh," Kankuro rolled his eyes, less sympathetic than his sister. On one hand, that made Baki a little relieved, that he wouldn't have to argue with two people at once. On the other hand, he was a little disappointed in Kankuro, for not being more loving towards his younger brother, even if it _was_ justified. "Why do you even care so much about the guy, Temari? Remember all the times he threatened to kill us – "

Temari turned on him. "He's our _brother_! Messed up or not, he's still – look, I understand your reasoning, and Gaara isn't my favorite person in the world, either, but he's still a _person_."

"Look, Temari – at this point in time, we haven't done such a great job caring for Gaara, either," Baki said softly. "His chances at a happy life were ruined the moment the demon was sealed into him. At least here, the Leaf promised to have their best sealing workers and mind specialists take a look at him. I don't know what sort of things they'll do to him, but he won't be losing control anymore. That I can assure you."

" _'He won't be losing control anymore'_? Of course he won't; they'll kill him, take the bijuu, and seal it into another one of their own if he does!" Temari yelled. "You're just as bad as our father! Only you're letting a _foreign village_ execute him instead of just giving the order yourself, you great big coward! Maybe Kankuro doesn't remember, because he was too young when Gaara was taken away from us, but I still know the _real_ Gaara, before he went crazy after one too many murder attempts. He was a good kid. They'll turn him into a weapon, Baki. They'll turn him into a weapon, and they'll use him _against_ us. Why can't you keep him? Ask them to trade something else! Money, or jutsu, or something. Gaara _isn't_ useless to us, Baki. One day we'll need him. We'll need the power of a jinchuuriki. And then you'll be sorry, when the Leaf has two and we have none."

Temari had a point, there. But what purpose did her argument serve, if it could not be realistically carried out? Baki would have tried his best to keep Gaara, had he been able to. But the reason _why_ they were in this situation in the first place was _because_ they were in no position to negotiate. The Sand had broken the rules; they had been caught; now they were going to pay. And the Sandaime Hokage drove a hard bargain – he was milking this opportunity for all it was worth.

"Money? We have no money. Our currency is worthless. They don't want our money," Kankuro snorted. " _We_ want _theirs_. It's why dad came up with this whole stupid plan in the first place. And our jutsu is useless to them, because those old softies don't have the skills to learn them. We have – poisons, and puppets, and stuff. Things that only _we_ can use, even _if_ we gave away those techniques to someone else. They have _teamwork_ and _friendship_ and a few geniuses that carry everyone else. If they could use our secret techniques they'd have copied it a long time ago."

"Isn't there _something_ you can do?" Temari asked.

Baki only shook his head sadly. "When you become Kazekage, you can let me know."

"Maybe I _will_ , then," Temari spat. "Obviously, no one else in this entire damn village is capable enough to wear that hat. I'll become Kazekage and I'll bring Gaara home and you'll all be sorry; mark my words."

"You do that, then."

Never had that old saying about not knowing what you're missing until it's gone had been so true. For all the times Temari had complained that wished that Gaara never existed, she now so desperately wanted to take him back.

* * *

 _The Hokage's Office_

The Sandaime was not having a good day.

Actually, he _had_ been having a good day – the negotiations with the Sand village were going just as expected. The temporary leader they had at the moment – a young Jonin named Baki – was skilled, but not smart. At least, not experienced enough in administrative leadership positions to match the political savvy of an old man who had dealt with the likes of Danzo Shimura for his entire life.

Although, to be fair, Danzo _technically_ only disagreed with him on the execution, and not the final result.

Baki had caved easily enough. He had been even easier to play than originally anticipated. While most people in his situation would have blamed their situation on a predecessor whom they had no control over and repeatedly deny, deny, deny _everything_ , Baki had been completely open and honest. He did not want a war. He did not want any more lost lives. He did not want to have any remaining ties with the Sound, and had already cut all communication off with Orochimaru's subjects already.

Hiruzen appreciated his candid nature and his nobility. He cared about his people. A man of war who wanted peace. He was an ideal model of a human being that anyone should live up to. Konoha was touted as the most honorable of the shinobi villages, but in reality, if every man on earth was like Baki of Sunagakure, none of them would be in this situation in the first place.

The Sandaime, on the other hand, was simply laughing his socks off at his naivete.

You didn't just _do_ that; not in a political negotiation. The _smart_ thing to do would have been to bluff his way out of responsibility so that when the bargaining round started, he would have begun with a higher hand, at least. Pretend that they were still considering war, and would do all they could to deal the same amount of damage to Konoha as Konoha would give, and be happy with whatever havoc they might wreak regardless of personal cost, if you will. Because it _was_ true. Despite the fact that they were leaderless, the Sand could still do a lot of damage – both to Konoha's infrastructure, and to their reputation – regardless of whether Konoha actually knew about their plans to invade or not.

Of course the Sand _wouldn't_ do that; taking such risks were rarely profitable – but when you were locked in a room with another man and the only thing you were allowed to do was talk, then it was always good to push your boundaries. It wasn't as if mouthing off a few empty threats was _actually_ going to cost you lives (unless you were stupid enough to say something out-of-place that _did_ end up warranting a few assassinations here and there); that was _why_ verbal negotiation rounds like these were set up in the first place. They were testing grounds for theoretical war moves to take place without actually having to deal with the consequences.

Maybe it might have worked, or maybe it might have not. A bluff like that would be easier to see through – but at least by then, the negotiators would be too sick of the nonsense to push the case any further, and he might get to walk out of there with _something_ useful on his side.

Instead, Baki had placidly agreed to everything that the Hokage had dished out, and now, the Sand was stuck in a highly disadvantageous treaty. The loss of their jinchuuriki (though they hadn't had much use for it in the first place anyway) and the disqualification of all of their Genin from this Chunin exam round had been just the beginning.

Really, Baki was just too accommodating. Not even a single word of protest. Just because you were in no position to argue didn't mean that you still shouldn't _try_.

Obviously this man had never bartered at the farmer's market by himself before. The sellers always started at at least twice the actual price of their product. And, if they employed enough brute force and stubbornness (there was this one fishwife on the east side that refused to say a lower price out loud even if it was obvious that no one would buy it at that price), they might actually get high above the norm.

Hiruzen liked Baki. He truly did. An honest, open, man. But he was also the leader of a ninja village, and it would be embarrassing if he didn't take advantage of qualities like that.

In all honesty, the Sandaime wasn't sure if Baki even _understood_ all the implications of all the political terminology they had used during the discussion. God, he _hated_ lawyers. It was why he had studied all the books and tricks himself, instead of relying on one to do it all for him. Too bad most other shinobi, Baki being one of them, didn't think this way. Then again, if every shinobi and pickpocket out there also had such skills, the world would be doomed.

All that was left now was to actually sign the accords and start putting them into effect.

So, if the negotiations had tipped almost completely in Konoha's favor, then why was he having such a bad day?

Well, there were certain people in the world with the uncanny ability to ruin anyone's mood regardless of where it was before, and Kakashi Hatake was one of them.

Although, to be fair, this time, it actually wasn't his fault.

The conversation had started simply enough. A minor debriefing of everything that had transpired in the past few days, just to get Kakashi caught up to all that he had missed while he had been under Jiraiya's care.

"...So you're saying Orochimaru killed the Kazekage, but before that, they were planning this full-scale frontal assault together. As in, walking in and blowing stuff up in the same exact non-ninja way I've spent the past few months beating out of Naruto," Kakashi deadpanned.

"For the fifth time, _yes_. And before you launch into a tirade about how stupid that is – "

"Orochimaru was planning to use the invasion as a distraction for his personal plans, and Sand was hoping that would make us look like idiots in front of all the foreign dignitaries. Yeah, I got it," Kakashi said. "Now what?"

"In return for selling out everything they knew related to Sound, I allowed the Sand one hour to get all of their affiliates out of the village, with the exception of one hostage to ensure they wouldn't be pulling this trick again."

"Might I ask who?" Kakashi asked.

"You get three guesses, and the first two don't count."

Kakashi frowned, and then blinked. "Really? Their only jinchuuriki? I thought you were good, Hokage-sama, but _damn_ , that's just _cold_."

Half a second. Impressive. It had taken Danzo five.

"They never liked him much. The Fourth Kazekage was the only one who could control him, and with that man dead, he is more of a liability to them than he is an asset," the Sandaime shrugged. "Better for us."

"I'm pretty sure they didn't like him because he was an unstable, homicidal maniac."

The unspoken words - _Konoha, on the other hand, had no reason for disliking Naruto_ \- were ignored. Because now that Naruto was officially a ninja, and no longer an undignified prankster, his presence was much better tolerated among the general populace.

"I'm fairly certain that a faulty seal was causing the brunt of the...mental problems. They had a medic-nin do it, not an actual sealing expert."

"That's why Jiraiya was already headed here when I was bitten?" Kakashi asked. The Sandaime nodded. "Huh. I expected you to just extract the bijuu and stick it in someone we know for certain is loyal to Konoha."

Hiruzen glared, offended that Kakashi thought so lowly of his mercy. "You think I'd kill him?"

"It would be the logical thing to do."

"One, I don't murder children, even if they _are_ 'homicidal maniacs', as you put it, and two, I would rather not condemn yet another child to that fate if I can help it."

Kakashi was forced to concede that point, because it was true. He wasn't THAT far gone yet. A tiny victory for Hiruzen Sarutobi, but a victory nonetheless.

 _Three, because the Yondaime Kazekage's family still holds a good deal of influence in Suna, and his life might be advantageous to us later._

"Like it or not, he's still a member of a rival village. What will you do to make him loyal to us, if he was barely contained by his own village? Put him in some secret ANBU operation until he's so brainwashed that he'll be even less human than he is now? "

That was exactly what Danzo had suggested, actually. But given how restless the clans were growing, the Sandaime had decided to even out the playing field a little bit this turn by placating them instead. "I intend to hand him over to Inoichi Yamanaka for his re-education. The subtler methods are more effective."

There. That should be enough to get the clans to calm down a little bit. Maybe forget about their – whatever they were planning. But if they didn't, then that was fine, as long as the target of their ire was just Danzo and not Konoha itself, like the Uchiha had done. His job was only to keep the village stable, and the Fire Daimyo happy. This was already the case, and it would remain so, as long as neither faction outgrew the other in power. Eventually, of course, that equilibrium would break, but he'd be dead of old age or out of office by then, and in all honesty he was just so sick of caring about a bunch of petty selfishness that wouldn't even be his problem anymore in a few years' time.

Really, why couldn't those bastards just all shut up and start thinking about the village instead of themselves? They called _him_ an asshole (that, he couldn't dispute), but he was only the one stuck _making_ those difficult decisions because of the bullshit _they_ pulled. All of this could have been avoided if everyone just put aside their pride and let things go.

(Actually, _all_ of this could have been avoided if Danzo hadn't let his greed get the better of his common sense. Shibi Aburame and Inoichi Yamanaka by themselves would have let him get away with it, but Shikaku Nara was as vicious as the rest of them when provoked.)

"That still leaves the problem of two jinchuuriki in Konoha. How do you know this won't cause another round of bijuu-napping by Cloud?" Kakashi said, cutting into his thoughts.

"We will deal with them, should the need come to that."

"So what happens in the finals of the Chunin Exams, then?" Kakashi asked, giving up on that other topic. "I don't want any my kids becoming Chunin so early."

Your _kids, Kakashi?_ Hiruzen thought. "You won't have to worry about Shikamaru. He didn't make it to the final round."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow. "Really?" he said, sounding a little more pleased than you'd expect from a man who was just informed that his star student had failed.

"Chakra exhaustion. He was not in fighting condition when the preliminaries rolled around, so we were forced to disqualify him."

"I see."

"Of course, the fact that he stood up to Orochimaru one-on-one and walked away with _only_ chakra exhaustion warrants a field promotion to Jonin in and of itself – "

Kakashi cleared his throat.

" – but like I said before, I will put them on a probationary period. They will remain Genin under your care. When you feel that they are ready, or when they come of age I will give them their promotion. They will not have to take the exams again."

"So, since we've established they have no hope of being promoted, I don't suppose I can just withdraw Naruto and Ino from the finals, then?" Kakashi asked hopefully.

"For fuck's sake, Kakashi, they'll be _fine_! And shut up about that 'I care about their safety' shite; I know you're just being contrary for the principle of it." Kakashi smirked at him insolently, and the Sandaime shot him a nasty look before continuing. "If we're going to get some raised eyebrows from the dignitaries for having an all-Konoha final, we might as well give them our best."

"It's not like any of the other major villages are around to complain," Kakashi muttered. "You made sure of that."

"Excuse me?"

"Oh, I'm _sorry_. I meant to say, 'That sounds perfectly reasonable, sir,'" Kakashi snapped sarcastically.

 _It better._ "Would you like to explain to me why you're acting brattier than usual today?"

Kakashi crossed his arms and looked away. "Not really."

Hiruzen rubbed his nose. "Tell me, Kakashi, how are you _really_ feeling right now?"

 _I care about you, Kakashi. Seriously, I do. I care about your wellbeing, and it's not just because I need strong ninja like you out there after we've already lost so many other good people like Minato Namikaze and my students and Itachi Uchiha._

 _I swear. I care about you as a person. You are not just a valuable asset. Even though you are._

Kakashi looked as if he would argue again, but instead, to Hiruzen's relief, he simply deflated and answered the question honestly. "Not bad. My team is safe, and I'm alive, so…" his voice trembled and trailed off.

So something _was_ wrong.

"Kakashi, please. How bad was the damage?"

Kakashi paused, and then lifted his headband to show a deactivated Sharingan.


	20. Out of the Fire

_The Hokage's Office_

As soon as Naruto had received word that Kakashi-sensei was in the Hokage's office, he hadn't wasted a single second.

"Excuse me, you need an appointment – " the Chunin at the desk protested, but Naruto didn't listen. "Wait, I need your registration numbers – stand in line, like everyone else – !"

Like he'd ever be so un-awesome to wait in line. All these people were here to see the _Hokage_ , not _Kakashi-sensei_. There was no line for Kakashi-sensei! His sensei was behind that door, his sensei who he thought was _dead_ , would never see again, even though the Sandaime had told him that Kakashi-sensei was alive, but still, he had been missing, and he'd missed the preliminaries where Naruto had totally kicked Choji's ass (in a friendly way because Choji was cool, and they all laughed it off afterwards) and they hadn't gotten to see Kakashi-sensei since the exams and he missed Kakashi-sensei so much and so what if it had only been a couple of days because it sure felt like _forever_ –

"KAKASHI-SENSEI YOU'RE ALIIIIIIVVVVVEEE~!"

(Naruto hadn't gone kicking down doors and barging into rooms in a long, _long_ time, and it sure felt good when he did.)

He gathered as much power as he could in his legs and tackled Kakashi-sensei in his strongest hug. In hindsight, that might not have been such a good idea – had the Hokage's desk not been there, Naruto might have busted down a wall or something, and that was not good because then he'd have to pay for the damages, and that money would come out of his ramen funds –

– but come on, how many times in his life would he be allowed to tackle _Kakashi-sensei_ and not get punted into the ground for it? Seriously!

"Naruto! What have I told you about kicking down doors like that?" Ino yelled, yanking him off their teacher. "You _know_ he's injured; you might have made things worse!" She turned around and smiled sweetly (never a good sign) at a very flustered-looking Kakashi-sensei, and then, to Naruto's great indignation, proceeded to tackle him back against the Hokage's desk just as hard as Naruto had. "And _you_ …don't you _dare_ pull that self-sacrificial almost-dying bull on us again," she whispered.

"You humongous horrible hypocrite!" Naruto yelled.

Ino dismissed him with a wave of her hand. "What did I say about alliterative insults, Naruto? They _suck_."

"All right, you've had your turn," Shikamaru grinned, pushing her aside and wrapping his arms around Kakashi-sensei in the most boring way possible. "But seriously, no more trying to get yourself killed, yes?"

Kakashi-sensei stood there awkwardly, as if unsure what to do with so much affection. Naruto decided to remedy that by smothering him in even more affection. After all, the answer to all of life's problems was either a) dattebayo, or b) more dattebayo.

So Naruto threw all the rules that Ino had taught him over the past few months out the window, and proceeded to push everyone into one ginormous group hug.

 _Gai-sensei's rainbows and sunshine ain't got nothin' on us._

"You gotta promise, Kakashi-sensei. No more running off and almost-dying, okay?"

Kakashi-sensei stiffened, and for a second Naruto was afraid that they'd broken him. But then he unfroze himself, and, smiling at them fondly, said, "Shut up, brats. I do what I want. Now get off me."

"No," said Ino.

"Please?"

"No," said Shikamaru.

"You're crushing my ribcage."

"Too bad. _No_ ," said Naruto, squishing them harder.

Kakashi-sensei, still covered in a pile of Genin, craned his neck back to face the Hokage helplessly. "Get these little monsters off me," he begged.

"No," said the Hokage, smirking.

"We're not getting off until you promise!" Naruto yelled.

"Fine. No more running off and almost-dying."

"Promise."

"My word doesn't mean jack, but I promise."

For just that short moment of time, everything was perfect.

And then Shikamaru ruined everything when he asked, "Wait, sensei, what happened to your eye?"

* * *

 _One hour earlier_

 _UCC (Underground Containment Complex): Emergency Medical Attention Wing, Room 12_

"How are you feeling, Kakashi?"

Kakashi opened his eyes slowly, one at a time. "Just absolutely effing peachy," he rasped. A glass of water was shoved into his hands, and he took it gratefully. "Jiraiya?"

"Stupid boy," the man muttered. "Jumping in the way of a curse seal, _really_?"

"Was that what it was?" Kakashi mumbled. "I was more concerned about – "

"Saving your cute little students, yeah, yeah," Jiraiya waved his hand. "Don't ask me how they're doing. I've been cooped up in this place with you for the last few days." Kakashi looked around. There were two sleeping Jiraiya clones, one in each corner. All three of them looked exhausted.

"…How many days is 'a few'?" Kakashi asked.

"Two. I think," Jiraiya said, rubbing at the dark circles underneath his eyes. "And a half. Maybe three? I'll have to check again. You were dying of chakra poisoning, kid. I had to seal off your entire left side."

Kakashi frowned, and tried to twitch his arm. It felt slightly numb. And – so did his left eye. He opened and closed it. Yes, he could still see. But – he scanned the room, and even looked at his own hands – no chakra sight. None.

"Obito – "

"Still his eye, just no more Sharingan," Jiraiya shrugged. "In order to withdraw all of Orochimaru's nasty stuff coming out of the curse seal, I had to block off everything else and then quarantine the whole area. Your body was destroying itself as it tried to stop the advancement of the foreign chakra. We can't let you able to move any energy through that area for a while, or the disturbance might cause the blocks to explode, and then…it will start killing you again."

It took Kakashi a while to process this information. "…Oh. So – so – "

"That means your balance will be off, your chakra control will be out of whack, and your ninjutsu and genjutsu will basically be useless until you somehow miraculously discover how to do one-handed seals. And before you decide to go and try something stupid – know that even if your chakra pathways weren't screwed up, we'd still have to keep the area quarantined, otherwise…well. Orochimaru shit. AKA bad stuff. Get it?"

"…Orochimaru…shit?"

Jiraiya groaned. "Look – I don't want to really talk about it. Orochimaru's kind of a twisted sort of person, if you haven't noticed."

"Is there some living thing inside this seal?" Kakashi asked warily, poking the dark smudge.

"Not exactly _living_ …more like a _piece_ of a living thing. You know how the Yamanaka do all their Mind Transfer stuff? This is like it, except instead of the whole entire mind, it's more like a tiny fragment," Jiraiya explained. "Of him. You destroyed his body pretty nicely…but I'm sorry to tell you, he's not dead yet."

 _What? Wait, WHAT?_

" _What._ "

"Don't make me say it again. You heard me right."

Kakashi felt as if someone had dunked him in an ice cold bath. "So all that was for nothing."

"Well, not really. Every moment he's out of commission is every moment we have to prepare for the next time he tries to come back – "

"But there's a _piece_ of Orochimaru inside this seal, and as long as I'm alive I'm also keeping _him_ alive – "

"Not just you. Every other fool unlucky enough to cross his path and survive. Maybe you should thank your own body for negatively reacting to the point of almost killing you. In order to remain operational, the curse seal needs to feed on the victim's chakra, and the way this one was designed, it wouldn't have been able to use lightning anyway. Now, if it had actually hit that boy it was intended for, that little shard of soul from Orochimaru would have assimilated into his more compatible chakra system like a parasite, and then it would have been _really_ impossible to remove. Beyond my help."

"Oh, so there's more of them. That makes me feel so much better. So what happens in the people with faulty seals?" Kakashi asked.

"Something like this? They'd die. Orochimaru went through hundreds of test subjects trying to perfect this thing, if you remember. That's why it's a curse. If it's not compatible, your body rejects it and you die. If it is, you're stuck with it controlling you for the rest of your life. You're a special case, kid. You really should have died. If Sandaime hadn't cared for you so much that he literally forced me to come back here at top speed, we would have been too late."

"That's nice."

"Look, Kakashi," Jiraiya snapped, "I've already trapped it there, it's not going to come out, and in about six months to a year of no chakra, that _thing_ will starve and die, and you'll be free of the chakra block. As for the rest, we're already working on it, so don't worry your pretty little head about it. Just focus on regaining your chakra control and improving your taijutsu, and then we'll see what else we can do."

 _Six months to a year._ Kakashi's heart sank. "And what about after that?"

Jiraiya sighed. "This…chakra pathway stuff is way out of my league. I'm just here for the seal work. Even the best medic-nin know little about it. But we're not even there yet; we still have to wait for the Curse Seal to die."

"All right. Let's fast-forward to next year. The Curse Seal is dead. Now what?"

"Well, once the gates over the curse seal have stabilized, I'll be able to remove the chakra blocks on your left side. After that, it's all up to how your chakra pathways heal," Jiraiya said. "If they do heal, then there's no reason why you shouldn't go back to normal with the proper training. If they don't, then you'll just be stuck with a dead arm, I guess…"

"Is there nothing anyone else can do about it?" Kakashi asked.

"If I could, I would, Kakashi. You're lucky to be alive."

Kakashi looked down and started fiddling with his thumbs – a nervous habit that he hadn't seen since his father died. "I see. Thank you."

"It's…nothing, kid." Jiraiya ran a hand through his hair. "Really. After all the shit that's happened to you, you deserve more than just survival."

They sat in silence for a bit more. Kakashi really didn't know how to respond to that. After all the shit that he had _done_ , he thought that the world kind of balanced things out in what he received and what he deserved. At least it was just an arm, and not his whole body, like Shikamaru had done to Orochimaru.

 _No ninjutsu. No Sharingan, and no ninjutsu._ Was everything that mattered to him destined to be stripped away?

Last time he had felt this empty, it was when he had completed his fifth or sixth back-to-back ANBU mission and was about to collapse from exhaustion. Except instead of collapsing, he wanted nothing more than to just curl up on the ground and scream his own throat raw.

"Fine. That's…fine," Kakashi said instead (because if there was one thing he was still good at, it was pretending that nothing bothered him). "Thanks for the help, Jiraiya. Now, if you'll excuse me, my cute students are waiting – "

Jiraiya held him back. "Take it easy, kid. You still need to rest." Kakashi shrugged him off and struggled to climb off the cot.

"At least let me find out how my team is doing first. It's been three days, hasn't it? They made it out of the maze without me, didn't they?" Kakashi babbled, his mind still high from the phantom pains of the past few days.

"You really have a one-track mind, don't you, kid?" Jiraiya sighed. "Fine. I'm not going to pull a Tsunade and lock you in. But if you keel over or something, it's not my fault."

"Of course not," Kakashi said distractedly, already fully dressed and halfway out the door.

"At least go see the Hokage first! A lot of shit went down while you were out and you should probably debrief before those brats of yours give you a heart attack!" Jiraiya called after him.

* * *

 _The Hokage's Office_

And so that was what we were left with, after everything was said and done. A ninjutsu master with disrupted chakra control. This was worse than Lee, who'd had his whole life to adapt to his disability. Kakashi-sensei had been relying on this skill his whole life. And, just like all of the other problems I faced, they couldn't be solved simply by increasing my own skill levels – otherwise, I'd have been in the library and the hospital digging up all the resources I could find about fuinjutsu and medical ninjutsu ages ago.

"You said he'd be _fine_ ," I glared at the Hokage accusingly.

"I did not know it would come to this," the Hokage sighed. "I thought Jiraiya would be able to fix things. Orochimaru turned out to be wilier than I expected."

I shook my head. Some of the blame could go to him, for providing us with faulty information (presumably to keep our morale up right before Naruto and Ino would fight in the preliminaries), but it would be unfair to blame him for _everything._ Sand and Orochimaru started it, after all. So I had to forgive him. Why stew in my misery, when taking action would have better results?

"Will it ever get better?" Naruto asked.

Kakashi-sensei shrugged.

"You can still use taijutsu and other things, though, right?" Naruto asked. "Kind of like Lee."

I wanted to open my mouth and say that it would be a little harder than that, but Ino hushed me.

"I…suppose…" Kakashi-sensei said. "I mean, it's not as if I just wasted the last two decades of my life mastering something that I can't even use, now, but, you know, that's how my luck flows. At least I'm still alive, right?"

Naruto beamed as brightly as a thousand suns. "Of course! You'll totally get better, and then you'll kick that chakra whatsit problem thingy in the ass and get even stronger! I mean, Gai-sensei is totally strong, too! And that fuin-whatsit thingy Shikamaru was trying to tell me about the other day − that doesn't need hand seals either! So, see, instead of thinking about it like 'I can't use ninjutsu anymore', think about it like 'I can do all this other cool stuff now that I don't have to focus on ninjutsu anymore!' Isn't that cool? Sure it is!"

"I guess so."

"…You _will_ be all right, won't you, sensei?"

Kakashi-sensei smiled back. It looked extremely fake. "Come on, Naruto. I'm _never_ okay."

The rest of the conversation consisted of Kakashi-sensei dodging questions (as usual) by distracting Naruto and Ino with training arrangements for the Chunin Exam finals. Ino would be working with her family, and Kakashi-sensei was planning to hand Naruto off to a friend of his. None of it pertained to me, and so I ignored them and turned my thoughts inwards.

Like Kakashi-sensei, I was substantially less optimistic than Naruto, but for an entirely different reason. Kakashi-sensei was injured because of Orochimaru, because of Konoha, because of _us_. In the first case, Orochimaru was already gone (for now), and for the third case, I could make myself stronger so that Kakashi-sensei _wouldn't_ have to come running to rescue us every time there was an S-rank foe around.

But for the second…well, we were ninja, I couldn't prevent circumstance – or orders – from sending my friends into a death trap.

At least, not in my current position.

What I needed were some more… _friends_.

But not just any "friends".

 _Useful_ ones.

I knew just where to find them.

* * *

 _File Room B_

"What are you doing here?" Izumo asked.

"Just being curious," the kid said. "It's not against the rules."

"Sure it's not, but we're really busy people. So I'd rather if you didn't get in our way." To make his point, Izumo heaved a large box of files from the ground and dropped it on the table.

Undeterred by the heavy _thump_ of paper, the kid simply cocked his head to the side and asked, "You and Kotetsu are the Hokage's assistants, right?"

It would be accurate to say that Izumo was a little bit surprised. Not because it wasn't true, but most people didn't refer to Kotetsu and him by that more dignified term. Being a village of ninja, everyone saw through that for what it really was – glorified secretaries. Pencil pushers. Just another desk Chunin, when they weren't watching the front gates, albeit one in the Hokage's office instead of the mission room. He narrowed his eyes suspiciously.

"If you're here to make fun of me, scram. When you outrank me, then we'll talk again."

"I'm not here to make fun of you," the kid protested. "I honestly don't get why people don't take you two seriously, just because you don't have a combat position. Administration is one of the most important tasks in Konoha, even if it doesn't involve anything life-threatening. I mean, yeah, it's boring, I won't sugar-coat that – but without it everything would fall apart."

Izumo snorted, but that didn't stop him from feeling internally pleased all the same. _Finally_ , someone who appreciated the work he did. Even if he didn't do much. "If only everyone thought the way you did. Say, what's your name?"

"I'm Shikamaru."

"Shika…Oh! You're Shikaku's kid. So, what can I do for you?" Izumo offered, mind clicking as fast as it could go. After all, potentially befriending the son of the Jonin commander had to count for _something_. This might just be his chance to finally transcend the no-name rut he was stuck in.

"Eh, not much. I was just curious about what exactly your work entailed. I mean, a village as big as ours goes through a lot of paperwork, right?" He peeked over the edge of the filing cabinet. "I see the Hokage at the mission desk all the time, but he can't possibly go through every single little D-rank by himself."

"He helps out when he can, but you're right – everything non-classified below A or S-rank is sorted by Chunin. Actually, even classified missions go through me. I don't get to see what they're about, or who they're assigned to, but it's pretty easy to tell what that million-yen change in the accounts means," Izumo explained. "Every village works that way, pretty much. Can't waste valuable fighters on menial tasks, so they dump them on guys like us. Too smart to be wasted on D-ranks and too dumb to be sent out into the field."

A tiny lightbulb of confirmation seemed to turn on over Shikamaru's head. "So, you get to know about what missions are coming in, even before they're posted in the mission room."

"Yeah. But I mean, unless it's a national emergency, you _do_ have the right to reject a mission you don't want," Izumo reminded him.

Shikamaru smiled. "I know. But, suppose you saw a mission that you _really_ wanted to go on, and you wanted to get your hands on it before anyone else of the same rank…"

Izumo raised his eyebrows, and slowly, a grin made its way onto his face. _Oh, we're finally getting to the good stuff._ "What exactly do you have in mind?"

"Hmmm…" Shikamaru tapped his chin. "Let's start simple. How many missions does the Daimyo send out? Not his wife, but – "

"The head honcho himself? Not many. Unclassified ones, at least. He's probably doing a lot of behind-the-books negotiations with the Hokage. Most regular tasks, he's got the Twelve Guardians for. Occasionally, however, he might just run into something not worth sparing his bodyguards for, but too difficult for regular workers to do efficiently…"

"…Suppose a mission like that came up, and the parameters were something my team was qualified for. Would you consider us for the task before any other Genin or Chunin team?"

"Maybe. Suppose, in a few years' time, I've trained enough to be ready for a rank promotion, skills-wise, but I don't have a recommendation to be considered before the judging board. Would someone like, say, the Jonin Commander be there to stand up for me then?"

"I think that would be a very reasonable agreement," Shikamaru nodded.

Izumo held out his hand. "Then the next B-rank from the capital just might very well be yours."

This might have been just a rookie Genin, but in that moment when Izumo shook hands with him, he seemed to stand taller than the Akimichi giants.

* * *

 _The Yamanaka Clan Compound_

"Dad, what do you think will happen to Kakashi-sensei? _Realistically_ , I mean."

Inoichi lazily balanced a kunai on his finger. "How so?"

"His entire arm's messed up because of Oro – sorry, because of something highly classified and way above my clearance level – and now…" She gulped. "I want to be optimistic, but I don't want my hopes killed, either. Shikamaru and I went and looked up chakra-system injuries. They're the hardest ones to fix. And his whole specialty was, like, elemental ninjutsu and hand seals. It wasn't just _fighting_ for him – it was like, one of the few thing on earth he legitimately enjoyed. What's he going to do now?"

 _She's too sensitive,_ Inoichi thought. If he could have his way, he'd preserve that part of her forever. But this was Konoha, and their skills were always needed.

As part of their pact with the village, all Yamanaka clan heads were required to respond to interrogation requests from central command, in the same way the Uchiha clan heads used to head the military police force before the massacre. And since Interrogation and Intelligence were both sectors of ANBU, it meant basic ANBU training was required for participation.

"You know, Ino," Inoichi said, "I've known Kakashi Hatake since he was a child and I've fought alongside him for almost as long. That guy can worm his way out of any situation. It's why he's still alive, despite everything he goes through. You've got to remember, Rock Lee has no choice _but_ taijutsu. Kakashi Hatake is still a very highly dangerous and accomplished ninja, with or without ninjutsu."

"I _know_ he's still a good ninja, but my _point_ is that he no longer has that, you know, extra level of power. You know how Kurenai-sensei is a master of genjutsu and Gai-sensei is a master of taijutsu. Kakashi-sensei was the master of ninjutsu, and now he can't even use any for a while. Not that I want some crazy famous person for a sensei, because I can't really _brag_ about getting pushed into mud puddles on a regular basis – but doesn't it hurt, to think about completely losing something that you studied for nearly your whole life? Like being a musician, and then waking up one day to find out that an illness has left you deaf, so now you have to start all over in life?"

It wasn't as bad as it sounded, really. Each sector of the black ops had different skills, and unlike the hunter-nin and the assassins, which had harsher training requirements, they were only required to know security procedures, like codewords, hand signs, and basic self-defense. Easy stuff, for Ino.

But _all_ ANBU were required to have some level of desensitization, and _that_ …

Inoichi knew he should have started her on it by now, in the same way his father had started on it when he became a Genin – _"Really, there's nothing to it; the Mind Transfer doesn't even hurt people, so it's best to just use it on the prisoners now rather than turn them over to the torturers."_

But for some reason, he didn't think it would sit very well with his daughter, who was too open-minded for her own good.

And so he didn't.

"Perhaps. It is a major setback for him; I won't pretend that it isn't. But it is _not_ the end of the world. Nothing is, not even death," Inoichi smiled, tapping the side of his head. "It's all up here, Ino. As for his ninjutsu, don't worry about it. He's still young enough to find something else to specialize in, and, in all honesty, it's probably best for him that he does. It's no secret that he has barely average chakra reserves. Being a ninjutsu master should be reserved for people with unflagging power, people who can spam big and fancy explosions many times in a row."

He felt a little guilty, exposing all of Kakashi Hatake's weaknesses to his daughter. All Genin, this early on, subconsciously put their teacher on a pedestal of invincibility, just like how the Academy students looked up to the Chunin instructors or how young children looked up to their parents. That he was such a _strange_ man didn't detract from her perceptions of his power – on the contrary, only the best ninja could confuse a Nara.

But she had to learn this at least, and quickly. In this world, there was no such thing as immortality, and assuming so of yourself or someone you cared about was extremely dangerous.

"Like Naruto, you mean?"

He nodded. "Most people of his stamina and control ratio class should be in a more delicate field, actually – like medical ninjutsu, genjutsu, codebreaking, and so on. That he made it all work in the first place is an accomplishment…he _was_ a prodigy, after all. But if you ask me, it definitely wasn't the most efficient way for him to spend his talents."

"But you can't do medical ninjutsu or genjutsu with only one working arm, either," Ino pointed out. "He said his chakra control's been practically eliminated."

"The world knows him _for_ chakra, but ask anyone in ANBU and they'll tell you he was the best tracker, assassin, and swordsman in the force, _because_ he didn't have to spend a single drop of it. Having to start over might be one of the best things to happen to him, even if it doesn't seem like it at the moment," Inoichi said. "His problem isn't a lack of options. It's _moving on_. It's why he stands in front of a rock mourning men that died a decade ago. He might _act_ like a leaf in the wind, unaffected by any insult the world throws at him, but really, he's just as rooted to the earth as the rest of us."

Inoichi stabbed the kunai into the ground. "Well. I should note he hasn't been wallowing before the Memorial Stone as much since your team was assigned to him. Maybe it wouldn't be too much to believe that you might also help him see the parts of himself that he cannot."

* * *

BONUS #14

 _How to Be Ninja_

1\. You should never assume you're safe.

2\. If you're gonna be stupid, be smart about it.

3\. Don't ever give someone else the advantage.

4\. Anyone sees you, and it's over.

5\. Don't screw up.

6\. When lying, never get caught in your own lie.

7\. I'm not gonna guarantee your safety if you manage to piss me off.

8\. Better to let others underestimate you than die famous.

9\. No one you know is completely trustworthy, not even yourself.

10\. If falling down hurts, whining about it will only hurt even more.

(Now read every third word.)

#ninjarickroll #aprilfools


	21. Some Not-So-Unexpected Allies

BONUS #15

An extra scene from Chapter 20 has been posted on the forum.

* * *

 _Chimiyo Street Playground_

Having secured Izumo Kamizuki's loyalty, I then started seeking out next best source of information someone in my position could get.

 _Look underneath the underneath._ With my current standing as a twelve-year-old Genin, it was impossible to get into contact with those holding obvious influence. I did not have the money or resources (I wasn't about to go steal from my own father; I'm not stupid), and even if I did, those people were already bought out.

"Prodigy" or not, I was aware that there were other intelligent people in Konoha. People with experience. People who already _had_ a stable income of power. Why switch your loyalties from something clearly working _now_ , to gamble on a kid? It was an unwise move, and the power game was not won with idiocy. No, I'd have to prove myself and start from the bottom just like everyone else first.

It worked out for me, because I didn't want to target the big and powerful people immediately anyway. The entire _point_ of being "just" a Genin was to be subtle and unnoticed. And this was enough to keep me going.

I was a ninja. I didn't need things to be official. Not having a stamped and signed piece of paper didn't make the state of the world any less true. There were so many people in the world who had influence and knowledge, despite not having titles or even shinobi training. People who were considered to be unimportant by others. People who might even consider themselves unimportant. People who didn't know just exactly how much power they actually had.

The Hokage was on his own side. But one step away, his office drones, like Izumo and Kotetsu, were not.

In the same way – Danzo was unreachable, obviously, as were the other two elders on the Hokage's Council – but their grandchildren were not.

"Who are you?" Konohamaru glared up at me, wrinkling his nose.

"I'm Shikamaru. I'm Naruto's teammate."

His attitude did a complete flip at that. "You know Naruto-nii?"

"Yes. He's training very hard for the Chunin Exams right now."

"I know," Konohamaru sighed, kicking a rock sadly. "Ever since he graduated and became a real ninja, he hasn't had much time to play with us anymore."

"Yeah, well, the life of a Genin is pretty busy. But, if you like, I can remind him to drop by more often."

His face lit up. "You'd do that for me?"

"Of course! He hasn't forgotten you; don't worry. He just really wants to pass the exams, so he can become stronger. Just like you, right?"

Konohamaru punched the air. "Yeah!"

"Say," I said, channeling a bit of Iruka-sensei, "while we wait for the exams to end, do you want to spar? I have a lot of free time right now, because I'm not as good as Naruto and didn't make it into the third round. Everyone else in my year is off doing other stuff, but I figured, since you followed Naruto around a lot before, you should know a thing or two about being a strong ninja."

Naturally, they ate it all up.

"Yeah! Let's go! I bet we can totally take him!" Konohamaru cheered.

"I don't know…" Udon said, wiping his nose on his sleeve. "I mean, he's already a Genin…"

"Don't worry," I told him. "We're all Konoha nin here. This is just a friendly spar."

It wasn't the most interesting thing I'd done, fighting with three eight-year-olds. In the back of my mind, I wondered if this was how Kakashi-sensei had felt fighting us, three Genin fresh out of the Academy, during that thrice-be-damned bell test.

But I put up with them, because they were good friends of Naruto.

Who also happened to live in the same house as the Hokage and two of his advisors.

"Your grandmother is Lady Koharu, right?" I asked Moegi. "I hear she does important things in the village."

"Eh, she's boring," Moegi shrugged, trying to jump on my back. "All she talks about all day is boring stuff. Like yesterday, she and Udon's grandpa did nothing but drink tea and complain about Sand nin and some one tail thing and Ino-whats-his-face. Like, hello? What sort of animal has one tail?"

"Gee, I don't know," I said, in mock concentration. On the inside, my brain was churning. _So_ that _was the terms of peace. The One-Tail. Their only jinchuuriki, and child of their former Kage, a hostage. And Ino's father is involved._ "Most of them?"

"Ex- _act_ -ly!"

This, of course, was not classified information; the higher-ups did not get where they were by being stupid. I bet the Hokage was probably hoping that something like this would make its way to Iwa or Kumo. Being able to bully another village into giving up a bijuu was no easy feat; something like this would likely make the others think twice before acting.

But there was a difference between foreign Kage and me, a kid. A close friend of my family was involved directly in this, and yet I would have never found out anything had I not thought to ask the exact right people.

"So, how about you, Konohamaru? What's your grandfather been up to lately?"

Dodge. Kick. Weave. Backflip from a tree.

"Eh, nothing new. I've been learning lots, but the old man's still the same as ever. I mean, he's super nice to me, but I feel like he doesn't take me seriously, you know?"

"Yeah, I understand," I said, surprisingly completely truthful. "Even as Genin, adults don't think much about us. And, actually, even adults get talked down to by – older adults. It's a whole entire pecking order of grown-ups."

"How _old_ do I have to get before I get a little respect around here?" he sighed.

"It's nothing to do with age." I was speaking to myself more than I was speaking to them. "Respect is earned, not given. And some people never give out any respect as long as they live. Or they give it out randomly. You just have to deal with that however you can, I suppose. Life isn't perfect, and it isn't fair."

Konohamaru huffed frustratedly.

"Hey," I told him, "don't be mad. Everyone starts out like this. If you want to earn respect from your grandfather, just work hard and become more knowledgeable. It'll be years and years before you know enough jutsu to surpass the Hokage, but simply understanding the boring parts of his job is a lot easier. There's more to becoming strong than just beating up bad guys."

"But it's _boring_ ," Moegi whined.

"That's what adults do. The difference between adults and kids like us is that adults can put up with the boring stuff even though they'd rather be doing something else," I explained to them. "So if you want to look more mature and get more respect, figure out exactly what that boring stuff is and understand it, and then adults will start respecting you. The more they respect you, the more boring stuff they'll tell you – yes, I know it's _boring_ – but once you get that, you can get even _more_ respect. Get it?"

"So the boring stuff is a bit like money, except not as cool," Moegi pondered.

"No, it's not," I agreed, "but you can buy things with it all the same. Except, instead of things like toys or candy, which you have a lot of anyway, you can get acknowledgment, which you don't."

"That makes sense," said Udon.

I smiled. "More importantly, you have to _know_ those things to be a good Hokage. And you know who else wants to be a good Hokage, besides you?"

"Naruto?" Moegi said.

"Naruto," I confirmed. "I guarantee you, the easiest way to get Naruto to hang out with you more is to have something that can help him reach his goal. We already have jonin sensei for jutsu, but you – you three can give him something no one else can give him…"

"Boring stuff?" Konohamaru moaned.

"Yep. Though, you can't call it that anymore. If you want to be taken seriously, it's 'information' or 'intelligence', like in those S-class missions."

"Whoa! So is this an S-class mission?"

"Sure. Which is why you can't tell anybody about it." Actually, it didn't matter if they did; the Hokage had better things to deal with than our silly games. Unlike Kumo or Suna, I didn't plan on being a threat to my own home. "Except Naruto, of course. Everything you learn, you have to make sure it gets to Naruto, okay?"

"Yes _sir_!" Moegi declared, going into a salute, and then they all fell over giggling.

 _I can see why people agree to become jonin sensei,_ I thought. _They're so cute!_

And then two seconds later, I realized, with horror, _Oh god, I sound just like Kakashi-sensei._

* * *

 _Training Ground 8_

Gaara crushed the flowers underneath his feet. But they didn't squash completely. So he took some of his sand and ground it to sap.

There. Now they were completely squashed.

He wanted to kill something, but he wasn't allowed to until the plan happened.

Well. Not people, at least.

A squirrel was jumping around at the edge of the tree line. It noticed him, and scampered away.

His finger twitched. _Just a little…no one will notice…_

The next thing he knew, a giant green and pink thing had engulfed him, and that was all he saw before everything went black.

* * *

 _The Hokage's Office_

The Hokage's eyebrows disappeared underneath the brim of his hat. "Already? Really? I would have expected a bit more fight."

"Hey! I can be sneaky when I want to!" Jiraiya protested.

The Hokage shrugged. "Well, this _is_ the same boy Sunagakure failed to contain for the past twelve years."

"That's because they didn't have awesome magical Gourd toads."

"All right, Jiraiya. If you say so. I trust the sealing went properly?"

"As well as it could have. One of the rare cases where I'm actually thankful for Orochimaru's experiments; whatever he designed the Five Elements seal for, it was useful enough here. I thought it would be safer to deny him access to chakra altogether until he's sane enough to control himself. We're currently housing him in an ANBU unit outside of Konoha just to be safe," Jiraiya reported. "If I may ask, what exactly are your plans for him, Hokage-sama?"

"I'm going to try to make whatever remains of his childhood happy," his former teacher said, and Jiraiya was surprised to see the kind old man peeking out from the hardened lines of his face. He'd been afraid that man was gone. "Yes, it'll be a nice slap in the face to those Sand nin, but – it almost feels like I'm starting over…I didn't want to subject Naruto to this sort of isolation, but sometimes I wonder if it would have hurt him less to not have to face the villagers' scorn…"

"About that," Jiraiya interrupted, "I'm not so sure anymore…it's…well, not to disrespect Inoichi, but Gaara is different from Naruto. The monster was introduced into him with a faulty seal before his brain had even properly formed. It's…he might be a lost cause, sensei."

"To you, maybe," Sarutobi-sensei said, "but not to Inoichi Yamanaka. Have a little more faith in his skill and determination, Jiraiya. He will not give up on Gaara until he succeeds, until the end of the earth, if need be. This I promise you."

"And how are you so sure of that? What if it doesn't work?"

"Because Danzo's next in my queue if he fails."

And just like that, the kindly man was gone, and everything was back to business again.

Jiraiya opened his mouth, and then closed it. He took a few deep breaths. Shook his head.

"Huh. That's…pretty smart."

The Sandaime shrugged. "Loyalty is loyalty. I don't particularly care how it's achieved. The classic brainwashing scheme, as much as I despise it, is effective. Gaara is a sociopathic killer, yes, but he doesn't torture people for fun."

"A bit harsh, don't you think, sensei?" Jiraiya asked.

"Perhaps when he actually becomes one of us, I might change my mind," said the Sandaime. "I try to think of all people as _people_. Unfortunately, when it is _my_ people's lives at stake, I am not averse to thinking of others as not. We look out for our own. But. Anyway. I highly doubt it will come to that. From initial reports, everything he's done so far is out of his own twisted sense of survival. His motives and sob story background should be easy enough for Inoichi to decipher."

The roots of this callousness, Jiraiya knew, came from much deeper reasons. One of them being the fact that the Sand had willingly associated with and housed Orochimaru instead of attempting to catch him and turn in his head to the Bingo Book regulators, like a good ally should. They had all expected the betrayal eventually – alliances in the shinobi world never lasted long – but he knew that it still hurt. Both his student – and the people who were supposed to be their "friends." And now their young jinchuuriki was paying the price, for something that really wasn't even his choice.

For all that his sensei pretended not to care, Jiraiya knew…he actually did. Somewhere in there, underneath the hat and robe and wily smile, was the idealist who still hoped for teamwork and love and friendship. And so every time something like this happened, it would hurt.

"I _would_ rather that he support Konoha out of his own 'free will', if you can count it as that," the Sandaime said softly, "which is why I gave Inoichi first pick. The 'mindless soldier' archetype is just a backup plan. Luckily we do have a few secret weapons up our sleeve to ensure it never comes to that."

"And what are they?"

The Sandaime shrugged. "Kindness."

"Kindness," Jiraiya deadpanned.

"In the shinobi world, anything and everything is a weapon, including kindness. Kindness, love, friendship, comradery…to those who do not understand it, they are virtues that have no place in war. But you and I both know, Jiraiya, that emotions are what motivate a man long after his body quits on him." The Sandaime leaned back with a smile. "And what other hidden village but Konoha, has learned to weaponise _kindness_ so well?"

"Weaponizing _kindness_. Now there's an idea," Jiraiya mumbled. _I should have expected that. Of_ course _Konoha would weaponize anything that_ could _be weaponized, even kindness. Even effing_ kindness _isn't safe from becoming a tool of war._

The Sandaime grinned wryly. "You wouldn't believe what amazing things can happen, when a person who has been starved of love his entire life finally gets his hands on just a little bit of it. See, Jiraiya, the thing is, ideally, within a few years, Gaara will have become mentally stable enough to actually control his own powers. And when he does, the Sand will see what they're missing and demand him back. And wouldn't it be great, to have a jinchuuriki loyal to us, the village he associates with kindness, more than their own village, which he associates with hate? What better way to hurt their morale and unity than to show that even one of their worst would prefer a rival village?"

"I guess that's true…And I'd believe you, if Konoha hadn't been so miserably bad in giving their _other_ jinchuuriki _kindness_."

"Neither have you."

"I was away on missions which _you_ assigned – "

" – and never bothered to come home to visit, leaving me, an old man with a family of his own and a village to run, and a Chunin instructor to fulfill your duties as his godfather. And Kakashi, of course, was a broken fourteen-year-old trying to kill himself in ANBU and even less stable than he is now, let alone fit to raise an infant. Let's just agree that we've all failed Naruto in some way, and that we were lucky it didn't bite us in the ass, unlike the Fourth Kazekage, who actually tried to _murder_ his own son. Repeatedly." He took a long inhale of his pipe. "We're keeping Gaara away from all the civilians until it's clear he's under control. By then people will have forgotten he was ever a psychopath, and he can start over on a clean slate. He might end up a bit socially awkward, but it's a small price to pay."

Jiraiya pondered this. Would the Sand have been more willing to hold on to the Ichibi if its vessel had been more, well, likeable? Or would they have been just as willing to give him away regardless of his sanity? The boy was the son of the late Kazekage, and he really would have been an important asset to their village, as a weapon if not a person…

Compare that to Naruto, who had an odd way of growing on people. The point was, despite his lonely childhood, Naruto was in a better state than most jinchuuriki.

They could never treat Naruto as they were treating Gaara. Not when the ghosts of Minato and Kushina hung over both their heads. And, of course, Kakashi wouldn't stand for it. He'd totally go ballistic on them. That whole Chunin exam thing that old Sarutobi had pulled earlier had _really_ been pushing it. Jiraiya had known Kakashi since way before all of the crap with Sakumo and Obito and Rin and Minato, when the boy was just a…well, not exactly _normal_ – he was never normal – but he _had_ been a kid _once_. A ridiculously talented but overly serious kid, naturally, but still. A _kid_.

They had gotten into some stupid argument about dogs and toads, and of course Jiraiya had ended up on the receiving end of the then-five-year-old genin's revenge not a week later. It was not pretty, to say the least. Jiraiya still had nightmares about…well, he'd rather not talk about it.

A lifetime of losing loved ones, coupled with a tendency to hoard negative feelings until he just fucking _snapped_ , was a perfect cauldron for the creation of vindictive little shits.

But how worse would the Leaf had treated Naruto if he hadn't been his bright and happy self? What if Minato had _not_ been an accomplished seal master as they would have liked, and Naruto ended up going mad with the hatred of the Kyuubi? Would they have abandoned him so easily, just as the Sand had given up on Gaara, too?

The truthful answer, though Jiraiya hated to admit it, was yes. Yes, they would have.

You really had to feel sorry for him. Both of them, actually. The world simply wasn't a fair or kind place, least of all for innocent and helpless children. If only their system itself wasn't so imperfect. If only their entire way of life was a completely different one. One that _wasn't_ based on lying and fighting and killing and all those things that parents were supposed to teach their children _not_ to do instead of _how_ to do it better.

Hiruzen Sarutobi seemed to know what he was thinking, and smiled sadly. "What a cruel world we live in, Jiraiya. The Leaf Village is not the kindest village. But we are the best at providing an illusion of free will."

Oh sure, they were the best at that. Everyone in Konohagakure no Sato believed that they lived in the happiest place on earth. Everyone, except for the people who they actually needed to fool with that smokescreen, like – Orochimaru, for example.

And, speaking of Orochimaru…

"What are we going to do about – the curse seals, sensei?" Jiraiya asked softly. "Kabuto's dead, but that doesn't mean Orochimaru doesn't have other trap doors. What are we going to do, hunt down _every_ person with a curse mark and incinerate their bodies?"

"I don't know," the Sandaime admitted.

"Well, you better figure it out, sensei. You've made excuses for him long enough. He's hurt too many people. You can't let this go on," Jiraiya told him firmly.

"We will speak more about that later. In the meantime, I have a mission for you." The Sandaime withdrew a scroll from his desk; Jiraiya could still smell the fresh ink on it. "It will be rather difficult and painful, but I know you can do it."

"I've dealt with Hanzo the Salamander and I'm dealing with a criminal organization full of S-class missing-nin. Just tell me, sensei; how bad can it be?"

Hiruzen Sarutobi smiled. "Finding Tsunade."

Jiraiya's smile dropped. "I don't get to reject this one, do I?"

"No, but you do get a mission partner to make things easier."

"Oh, goody. Who's it going to be?"

"Kakashi."

Jiraiya's head hit the floor.

* * *

 _ANBU Training Ground 96-2_

"So you knew Kakashi-sensei, huh?" the boy in front of him asked.

Yamato, also known as Kinoe, Tenzo, and Test Subject #4223, among other names, stared back at the child. His name was Naruto. Naruto Uzumaki. Kakashi had asked him to train the kid for the finals of the Chunin exams. Yamato couldn't really say no to that. Firstly, Kakashi was a very old and very good friend of his whom he would do anything for; secondly, he was one of the few people in the village who knew just exactly how bad Kakashi's physical state was right now; and thirdly, training a Genin for a month was hardly anything compared to some of the other stuff he had been through…

Actually, scratch that last one. Kakashi had specifically put in his notes to Yamato, _Watch out for this one. He makes sense only when you least expect it._

Coming from Kakashi-senpai, that may or may not have been cause for worry.

"Yes. He and I were on the same team when we were both in ANBU," said Yamato.

"Cool," Naruto said, swinging his feet. "So what are we going to do for a month? Learn cool new jutsus and stuff? Super top-secret black-ops training?"

"Actually," Yamato said, "yes."

"Whoa, _really_?" Naruto's eyes grew as wide as saucers – and then narrowed into slits. "You're not messing with me, are you?"

Yamato sighed. "No, I'm not. Ever since the… _problems_ caused by Sand and…Orochimaru…and the Hidden Cloud, the Hokage and your sensei both agreed that there are some very specific aspects of your training that we can no longer delay. Especially since there is now someone else in Konoha like you."

"Like…me?" His hands unconsciously jerked towards his stomach. "Was he – that kid – "

"You've met him before?"

"I think."

"Well, that makes the explanations a lot easier. Let's just say, he's – "

"Don't call him a monster," Naruto suddenly whispered. " _Don't_."

The abrupt change in Naruto's cheerful demeanor gave Yamato pause. There was much of him, Yamato realized, that was not the good-hearted but dimwitted prankster everyone believed him to be. "No. Of course not," he replied quickly. "No, not in that way. I only meant your situation. Both of you were born responsible for something that wasn't your fault."

This seemed to relax Naruto a bit. "Oh. Okay."

"He's under the care of some other ANBU for now," Yamato told him. "He's your age, but his life has been significantly less stable than yours. We're planning to keep him contained until we can be sure that he can control himself."

"…The Old Man's afraid that _his_ fuzzy-butt might explode and trample all over Konoha," Naruto said. "And he needs my fuzzy-butt to help stop him if he does, because everyone else is just going to get squished."

Yamato blinked. "That's a fairly creative way of putting it, but you're correct. Of course, the chance of that happening is ridiculously tiny. Jiraiya has already sealed off all his chakra. This is only meant as a precaution. You can never be too safe when it comes to the tailed beasts."

Naruto gulped. "Are we really going to be doing this? What about the Chunin exams? I wanna learn wind jutsu or something – I'm going up against Tenten, and I don't wanna get skewered − "

"I know you're not too happy about it, but think about it this way," Yamato said. "Your skill in ninjutsu at this point in time is already more than enough for you to hold your own against Tenten. Even if you lose, you will get credit for how well you fought – and Maito Gai would never allow one of his students to harm a fellow Konoha nin. But the fox – you're going to have to face it sooner or later, Naruto. It's perfectly fine, and probably even better for you, if you never choose to call upon its power. But at the very least, for your safety and that of everyone around you, you'll have to learn to control it, yes?"

That seemed to have the desired effect on Naruto, because he immediately returned to his determined self. "And then everyone will acknowledge me and I'll be the next Hokage!"

"Yes, yes, you'll become Hokage. But first, this. For your own safety, we are keeping all of this special training a secret, do you understand?" Naruto looked as if he wanted to protest, but after re-evaluating the malevolent nature of the demon fox, nodded in agreement. "So close your eyes, and look for the beast."

"What about you – "

"Oh, I'll be fine," Yamato smiled, putting his hands together. "You think they picked me out of all the ANBU for no reason?"

It was rare that Yamato ever got to show off, but the completely amazed look on Naruto's face when the circle of trees spontaneously exploded from the ground was so worth it.

* * *

 _The Otogakure Base_

"Orochimaru-sama is dead," Kimimaro informed his subordinates solemnly, "and the Sand has surrendered without a fight."

"What the hell?" Tayuya spat angrily. "Those cowards! And whaddya mean, _'he's dead'_?"

"I hate to agree with her," the fat one said moodily, "but Orochimaru-sama _is_ indestructible. His power is greater than any other."

"His body was destroyed before he could possess another one," Kimimaro explained.

"That is what I said. He is indestructible. How can he be destroyed?"

"Rumors say it was the Copy-Nin," Kimimaro said curtly.

"That's rubbish; Hatake's a flimsy piece of paper compared to Orochimaru-sama! He must be just hiding, or – or _something_ – "

"What does that Curse Mark on your shoulder tell you?" Kimimaro snapped, and the dissenter quickly silenced. "You can feel his energy weakening. Orochimaru-sama, the main body, is gone. His power now only remains among us. Until some other news comes up, we will assume that we can no longer contact him. In the meantime, we search for a way to revive him."

"Yeah, well, without that creepy crazy doctor guy," Tayuya said, "that's kind of pointless, isn't it?"

"There are others with knowledge of the Edo Tensei. We must simply find them," Kimimaro tried, but was interrupted again. Uncouth barbarians.

"Oi! Who died and made _you_ boss, anyway?"

The others turned and stared at Sakon like he was stupid. Which he was.

"Er. Sorry."

Kimimaro tried not to lose his temper. "We will, of course."

"But – "

"I'll hear no more of this nonsense," Kimimaro said curtly. "We will retreat and regroup later. There is no point in proceeding without Orochimaru-sama."

"What about us?" one of the unnamed experiments asked.

"Go find another place to hide and wait for instructions. If Konoha has captured Kabuto, then they will be here soon enough." Kimimaro felt a little bit guilty about abandoning them, but Orochimaru-sama came first. His master's word was law, but his master's existence surpassed even that, for it was only the existence of Orochimaru-sama that dictated his own. So, while Orochimaru-sama was alive, Kimimaro would follow his master's wishes. But as long as he was dead, Kimimaro would do everything within his power to save him.

* * *

BONUS #16

All of the cover art entries are in, which means you guys can now vote on them. Links are in my profile. Choices are **pimasta314(1)** , **pimasta314(2)** , **lumutness** , and **Francesca**. Sorry, no voting for the bunny this time around.


	22. Nobody and Nothing

**Props to lumutness for winning the cover design. Honorable mentions go to pimasta314 and Francesca for their submissions.**

 **Thank you to everyone who voted!**

* * *

BONUS #17

A deleted scene from Chapter 21 has been posted on the forum.

* * *

 _Training Ground 3_

"Hey, Shikamaru!" Naruto grinned. "You doing okay?"

"As well as I can," I said. "How was your new teacher?"

"Super cool! But – I, uh, can't tell you anything about it. It's top-secret," Naruto answered, and left it at that.

Seeing that he wasn't going to say anything more, I decided to change the subject. "I just met Konohamaru, Moegi, and Udon the other day. They told me to say hi."

"Oh! You talked to them?" Naruto asked. "That's cool."

"They miss you a lot," I said. "When the Chunin exams are over, you should come see them again sometime. Konohamaru can tell you a lot about what being Hokage is like. He acts like a little kid most of the time, but you just have to ask him."

Naruto considered this, and nodded. "Ah, okay. Gotcha."

"And make sure you discuss everything with me, too. If you want to reach your goal, you can't just parrot it back blindly. You have to understand it inside-out. It's tough, and it'll probably be confusing, but I know you can do it."

There was always the chance that I'd set my standards too high, that Konohamaru and his friends would be unable to do as I'd asked. But I had been careful in scouting them out and determining their reliability. Given what they'd _offhandedly_ told me about something that didn't even interest them in our small bout of interaction, it was clear that they were naturally a very observant group of people, if only they were dealing with things that mattered to them. Naruto, too – he might have acted like an idiot for most of his Academy days, but those times were long past.

If they were taking this seriously (and I knew they were; "I'm gonna be the next Hokage!" was hanging in the balance, after all), then they would continue to improve their skills now that they were actively paying attention. Konohamaru had not been difficult to read. He was flighty, like Naruto, but give him the right goal and he'd never give up. And if they didn't, and got bored or forgot, no harm done. The things they let slip to me by accident were better than nothing at all.

So Konohamaru and this friends were only eight. Well, we were only twelve. It didn't mean we had to stay helpless. I refused to be caught unprepared again.

Naruto broke out into a bright, excited smile. "Sure! Because I'm going to be the next Hokage! And also, Konohamaru's my friend, and friends listen to each other, right?"

"Right," I said, wondering if this was manipulative of me.

Was it?

… _Nah. It's not that different from the bell test, when I couldn't communicate to Naruto what was going on right away._

 _Right?_

 _It's not as if I'm hiding anything from him…well, maybe a little. But it's not going to hurt anyone. Konohamaru and his friends will get their grandparents' approval, Naruto will hopefully learn a thing or two about being Hokage, and I'll be kept in the loop. I'm not doing anything bad; I'm just making sure we don't get sent into a warzone again_

Ino was now approaching, so that was a cue to tuck away that particular conversation. I had a few ideas on what she could do to help, since she was in the same boat as the rest of us, but I didn't want her to be as buried in this as deeply as I was, if at all possible. Same for Naruto, actually. Konohamaru was his only responsibility, and they had already been established as friends beforehand. He would have nothing to do with Izumo Kamizuki or the invisible cloud I felt hanging over my father's head sometimes.

Should anything bad happen – which was highly unlikely, since I wasn't actually doing anything dangerous or against the rules – they would have plausible deniability. This was my way of balancing teamwork and safety. I was only doing what made sense.

Perfect, perfect sense. Right?

Before I could debate any further, however, Kakashi-sensei's familiarly irritating voice cut into my ears. "Hello, my cute students!"

"You're – not late," Ino realized belatedly.

It was true. He had actually arrived five minutes before our appointed time. I hadn't been expecting him until a good deal of time later, but maybe that was his plan to surprise us all along. Clearly, the world was ending, as Naruto was quick to point out to us in the most unnecessarily dramatic way possible. Kakashi-sensei ignored him, as he normally did every time anyone pointed out his hypocrisy.

"Now, why would I be? I would _never_ miss a chance to see my adorable little Genin," Kakashi-sensei said, dripping so much artificial sugar over his words that I wondered how he didn't get sick of it all the time.

"I'm a ninja! I'm not adorable!" Naruto protested. "I'm totally going to kick ass at the finals, just you watch!"

"Yeah! Me too! I can totally take Shino, because I'm not _scared_ of his stupid bugs, and – ew! Get it off me! Get it off me!"

There was a dung beetle crawling through the grass, and it was trying to climb over Ino's shoe rather than around it. Big mistake; she punted it into the next field as punishment.

Kakashi-sensei blinked, and then continued on as if nothing of interest had just occurred. "The main reason why I called you all out today was because I had a very important announcement to give you about my appearance in team meetings during your finals training period – well, more like lack thereof. That is, I won't be here for the remainder of the month. I'll try to make it back in time to watch you guys in the finals, though. So, I'm sorry I can't stick around, but…I'm going to be going on a very special journey on the path of life!"

We stared at him dryly. "Is it because of the whole 'no-ninjutsu' thing, Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto finally asked.

Kakashi-sensei sighed and nodded. "You kids were more fun when everything I did actually surprised you."

If everything he did could still surprise us we'd all have died of shock by now. You had to build up a tolerance to people like Kakashi-sensei. His personality was like being on drugs, only more cancerous and less fun. Not that I've ever tried purposely changing my own brain chemistry for the sake of personal entertainment.

Naruto bounced on the balls of his feet excitedly. "Where are you going? Are you gonna be training? Is it some super secret special awesome – "

"Officially, no," Kakashi-sensei said. "I'm just on leave for now, since my chakra pathways are still messed up, and it's currently beyond the help of anyone in Konoha general hospital. That's why we're going to a specialist outside of Konoha."

"'We'?" Ino asked.

"Someone else is accompanying me, for security reasons. Normally, I can make my way around alone, but you know…no ninjutsu," Kakashi-sensei trailed off, not wanting to explain more. That, I understood; however, it didn't stop the concern from bouncing around in the back of my head.

"Eh? But you didn't need any ninjutsu to beat up those other bandits from wherever," Naruto exclaimed. "Just how many people are chasing you, Kakashi-sensei?"

"Pretty much anyone with enough desperation and a recently updated copy of the Bingo Book," Kakashi-sensei shrugged.

He just seemed so _dejected_ , and I while I could easily share his feelings, I had absolutely no idea what to say.

Luckily, Ino did, and I was pleasantly reminded once again why we were arranged into teams in such a specific manner.

"Sensei, just because you can't use it doesn't mean it's absolutely useless. You can still recognize them – or teach them to others – and – look, whatever you do, remember that there's always a third way out of everything, okay? I get that ninjutsu is a big part of who you are, but it's not the _only_ thing that makes you…you." She looked skywards, like Kakashi-sensei had done so many times in his alternating moments of amusement and exasperation. "Every cloud has a silver lining, sensei. We've told you that already, but – once again, this is a chance for you to specialize in something that isn't a massive chakra eater." She looked back at him and grinned. "Worst comes to worst, you can just spend the rest of your days being late to meetings and messing with people's minds, like you've always wanted, right?"

"…Thank you, Ino," he whispered. And then he seemed a little more like his usual self after that. "You three. Remember to work hard, behave, wash behind your ears, stay out of trouble – "

"Speak for yourself."

" – and respect your elders, Ino, because I don't need any of that sass coming from you. Now, if you'll excuse me, my mission partner is waiting for me at the gate, so we'll have to say goodbye for now…"

"Waiting? As in how long?" Ino asked skeptically. "Three hours?"

Kakashi-sensei let out a badly dramatized gasp, not that any of us would believe his feigned offense. "I'm not late _all_ the time, you know."

Ino rubbed her chin, as if counting, and then nodded. "No, you're right. Not all the time."

"Thank you."

"…just _most_ of the time."

"Insolent children."

"Late person."

"Good-bye."

"Hypocrite."

* * *

 _ANBU Training Ground 96-2_

"Stop worrying so much, Naruto," Yamato sighed. "Learning to master the power of a tailed beast takes years and years. And you've got nine tails to get through – more than all the others. There's no need to rush. Really, I'd be impressed if you got the first tail down by the end of this month, let alone all of them."

Naruto groaned. "I just want to get it over with."

He loved training and learning new techniques. Yamato's tree thing had been so cool, and he'd been so mad when he learned that it was a bloodline limit he couldn't do. Naruto hated being told there was something he couldn't do, just like how Shikamaru always got that look on his face when people told him he wasn't allowed to know something. Then again, nobody else on earth could make as many shadow clones as he could, because he was just that awesome, so he supposed that was only fair.

"How about this, Naruto: If you work on this to my satisfaction, I'll…buy you ramen later. Okay?" Yamato suggested.

Ramen? Well, that always made everything better, so Naruto agreed. "Okay."

The wooden bars sprung up again, and Naruto sat down in the middle of the ringed cage. He didn't like talking to the fox. If you could call it "talking". All that jerk ever did was yell and throw insults at him. It was like it hated everything.

(It probably did.)

Naruto could sympathize a little, because he himself hated getting locked up, but at least he didn't go rampaging around Konoha, destroying buildings and killing people, when he was allowed out of time-out. Paint and stink bombs, fine, but that was a long time ago.

The training ground faded out of his eyesight. He was back in that dark sewer.

Silence. Silence all around, except for that occasional drip-drip of water.

 _Here it comes…_

 _CRASH!_

The warning rattle of the bars was all the warning he had to take cover before blinding heat and malevolent chakra engulfed him. Out of the darkness, an orange glow exploded like Ino's fire, the growl of the legendary demon fox vibrating his ribcage with the beat of his heart.

"BRAT!" it roared. "YOU DARE SHOW YOUR FACE HERE AGAIN?!"

Hatred seeped from its core in bloody red waves, but the chains binding it held fast. Even if they were not there, however, Naruto would not have let that stop him. He had felt pain and loneliness before. That was worse, to him, than just fear. Fear and danger came from outside, and things that were outside could be seen and dealt with easily enough.

Sadness, however, came from the inside, and affairs of the mind were much more difficult than that to fix. He was no mind-reader like Ino, but he didn't have to be to know these things. To be able to feel had always been a part of him. He had been stumbling blindly through life since birth, after all, and he'd never had a problem with it.

"This is my brain, so hell yeah I have a right to be here!" he retorted. "My body, my rules. Whatcha gonna do about it?"

"WRETCHED CHILD. ONE DAY I SHALL BREAK FREE, AND THEN YOU WILL REGRET YOUR DISRESPECT."

"So, nothing, then," Naruto said. "That's good to know."

See, he was getting the hang of this sarcasm thing!

The fox snorted. "YOU KNOW NOTHING, DISGUSTING IMP. YOU THINK BECAUSE YOU'VE WATCHED SOMEONE ELSE KILL A GIANT SNAKE YOU KNOW THE WAYS OF THE WORLD. YOU'VE NEVER TASTED DESPAIR, BOY. YOU'VE NEVER KNOWN THE SMELL OF FIRE AND BLOOD. EVEN IF A MONSTER STOOD BEFORE YOU, YOU WOULD NEVER SEE IT. I'LL _SKIN YOU ALIVE_ , BOY. I'LL HANG YOU FROM YOUR OWN JUGULAR AND MAKE YOU WATCH AS I BOIL YOUR PRECIOUS LITTLE FRIENDS IN THEIR OWN TEARS − "

Now, Naruto normally never paid attention to the stupid thing when it went into another one of its rants, but this was a bit of a sore spot for him. There were few people in the world that had accepted him unconditionally, and Team 7 had been the first place where he felt he truly belonged. He'd worked so hard for that small spot of happiness, and he wasn't going to let this dumb thing in his belly or brain or whatever ruin it for him like it had everything else.

"Now just a minute, asshole!" he snapped. "I don't care what you do to me, but my friends are off-limits, you hear? This right here stays between the two of us. Whatever you have against me, have the balls to say it to my face! Unless…"

 _Hook._

The fox shot him an ugly look. "UNLESS _WHAT?_ "

 _Line._

Naruto grinned mischievously. This trick always worked in the Academy.

" – Unless the great Kyuubi is actually a _chicken_."

 _Sinker._

Immediately, the Nine-Tails was frothing at the mouth. "YOU _DARE_ – "

"What else could explain having to use my _friends_ to threaten me? Looks like you're not so scary after all, if you can't even scare a kid like me." _Ha! Take that, you dumb fox!_

The chains shrieked again, but all the fox got in his attempt to escape his prison were even tighter restraints.

Naruto rubbed his forehead. "Look, I don't get why you're always so mean to me. We should be working together; we're both stuck in the same boat, after all. I die, you die."

" _You_ die," the fox hissed, eerily calm, "and you die forever. _I_ die, and I'll reform eventually. Last time I checked, dead people don't become Hokage."

And last time Naruto checked, he was also not the sort of person to climb over dead bodies for a hat. Team 7 had acknowledged him before anyone else. They would stand beside him, not underneath his feet. He would attain his goals and he would do that without letting the fox screw it up for him. "I would rather kill myself before I let you use me to hurt my friends."

"Ha. Ha. _Ha_ ," the fox said sarcastically, a lot more effective in its taunts now that it was no longer angrily spitting in Naruto's face. "You care about your friends, hmmm? They don't care about you. They look at you, and they see me. They'll be glad to be rid of you. They'll throw your corpse in a box in the ground and forget about you. You are and always will be Naruto the Nobody, the village idiot who thought he could be a king."

The vehemence with which the Kyuubi said this gave Naruto pause. Not because he doubted his friends. Maybe, before, when he had no friends and was an insecure child, he might have taken those words to heart.

But he knew the fox could not be trusted. Seeing Ino at work made him understand just how much effect words could have.

He'd seen Shikamaru throw himself between Orochimaru and their team. He'd waited for hours for Kakashi-sensei to detach himself from Konoha's most famous gravestone.

And he knew.

They were not ones to forget.

"You're just jealous," Naruto spat before he could stop himself. "Jealous that Naruto the Nobody still has more purpose in life than you – The 'Great' Kyuubi no Kitsune, Destroyer of Worlds, and Creator of _Nothing_."

The Kyuubi opened its mouth to respond, realized it had nothing to say in return, and snapped its jaw shut again.

Naruto extended a hand. "There's no such thing as 'is and always will be'. You don't have to be like this! We can always – "

He was interrupted with an angry scream and a hot flare of chakra, which struck him in the chest and threw him backwards. He landed on his behind in the pool of water, where his head was quickly submerged under the darkness.

Gasping. Gasping for air, because he would not lose here – whoever heard of someone drowning inside their own mind –

Next thing he knew, he was back in the grass again. The blue midday sky had since turned pink, and the branches of Yamato's jutsu had grown massively, to the point where great bushes of the stuff were coiled around the original stakes of the cage. Yamato himself was breathing heavily, and there was a thin film of sweat on his flushed forehead. Around him, there was a great circle of burnt grass leading up to the containment seals, where sparks of orange were still glowing among the browned brush.

The fox had been right about one thing, Naruto supposed.

He wouldn't know a monster even if it stood in front of him.

"Well. Looks like you made a little more progress than I expected from you…" Yamato began.

Naruto whooped and jumped up off the ground, the Nine-Tails entirely forgotten. "Does that mean we get to eat ramen now? Please please please please please – "

"Maybe we should – "

"YES! Ramen! Ramen! Ramen! – "

"Goddammit," Yamato sighed.

* * *

 _The Front Gates_

"I feel like someone is suffering because of me at this very moment," Kakashi said.

"Someone's _always_ suffering because of you," Jiraiya grunted, tossing Kakashi his copy of the mission scroll. "Now let's get going. The sooner we find Tsunade, the more likely she'll be able to do something about your arm, and the sooner you'll be able to return to your precious brats."

"I can't believe I'm leaving them already…" Kakashi said softly.

"We're coming _back_ , you know."

"I meant…leaving them alone. Most instructors get a few years in before they deem their genin ready to work without supervision…but – kids grow up so fast these days, you know? Only a few months and they're already Chunin-level…"

"They were Chunin-level before they even left the godforsaken Academy," Jiraiya said. "And I think it's a bit rich, coming from you, Mr. look-at-me-I'm-six-years-old. Also, I'd like to point out that for the past few years you've been doing nothing but complaining about every Genin team you got and scheming of ways to abandon them in a ditch somewhere."

Kakashi gave him a little smile. "You got me there."

"So, on with the mission?"

"Sure."

It was listed as an A-rank, but really, Jiraiya knew that it was only because their target was so important. And elusive. Though mostly important – it was no secret that the world was quickly going to shit yet _again_ and Konoha would need all of the powerful and non-traitorous ninja they had. Kakashi was a trained tracker, on par with the Inuzuka. He'd sniff her out eventually. The actual journey itself wasn't supposed to be that strenuous. A simple courier mission to an old student of the Sandaime, delivering a polite request – albeit a very strongly worded one. As in, "Tsunade, you will pack up your bags and put away your alcohol and march back home right now or there will be consequences."

"He could have sent anyone on this mission, you know," Jiraiya said. "There's a reason why he chose the two of us, even though you're injured."

"Mm-hmmm," Kakashi murmured distractedly.

Though Konoha liked to pretend that all of their shinobi were created equal on paper, everyone knew that there was a definitive class structure even among all the soldiers. There were ninja – your run-of-the-mill ninja – and then there were _ninja_. Which, ironically, went _against_ the whole purpose of the anonymity and mystery that the job required. Even so, being one of those rare "special" people, while slightly annoying when it came to missions that required discretion, had some small benefits of their own.

Central Command pulling strings _just for you_ was one of them.

Until Sasuke Uchiha received his third tomoe, Kakashi Hatake was the possessor of the only fully developed Sharingan in Konoha. The Sandaime would have been a fool, not to attempt to preserve such an asset. And, of course, only the best care for the best soldiers. It was a sorry little way to encourage people to work to the best of their ability, but it worked, and so the system stayed in place.

Just because Kakashi wouldn't be able to use chakra in his left arm for a while anyway didn't mean that they shouldn't start the healing process as soon as possible. Chakra-related injuries, from what little Jiraiya knew, were notoriously difficult to predict, even when left alone. If they waited until Jiraiya removed the locks over the curse seal before they started checking out the injuries in the surrounding area, they could become permanently damaged by then. And only Tsunade had the capability to properly diagnose a region of burnt chakra pathways when there was no chakra.

The point was, this mission was as much for Kakashi as it was for Konoha. They could have sent anyone else to "assist" Jiraiya in bringing Tsunade home. It didn't absolutely _have_ to be Kakashi, as talented as he was. If Jiraiya didn't know better, he'd say this was the Sandaime's subtle way of apologizing to Kakashi for setting up the scene that caused the chakra injury in the first place. Then again, who knew. Maybe Hiruzen Sarutobi _did_ have that spark of decency still left in him, after all. If it had ever existed in the first place. Jiraiya _knew_ that _some_ of that kindness his sensei always exuded around him had to be the truth.

He just didn't know which parts, or how much of it.

It could very well be that this mission really _was_ just bringing Tsunade back to Konoha, and whatever help Jiraiya and Kakashi received from her in the meantime was their own choice. After all, it well past the time that Tsunade returned to Konoha.

Their old sensei may have had a soft spot for all of them – even Orochimaru, as messed up as he was – but lately his patience had seemed shorter. Jiraiya didn't blame him for getting plain tired and sick of waiting on all of them – a man of his age should have been at home telling stories to his grandkids, not stirring up trouble among fellow shinobi politicians.

Or maybe Jiraiya himself was just getting better at seeing through the façade over the years.

Legally, she should have been recaptured years ago – she had abandoned Konoha and was a missing-nin just as Orochimaru was. The only difference was that one, she was really causing harm to no one (except for all moneylenders she had skipped out on) and two, none of the hunter nin were crazy enough to try to take on the Legendary Slug Princess, drunk or not.

"Good thing we're even crazier than they are, huh?" Kakashi asked out of the blue.

Yeah…Jiraiya didn't know how he did it, either. He decided to concentrate on the next town on their pathway coming up instead.

"Your Sharingan isn't draining your chakra anymore," Jiraiya pointed out. "You _can_ use both your eyes right now; you know that, right?" Of course he did; Kakashi wasn't as forgetful or socially inept as he pretended to be. Many ninja were trained to adjust their apparent level of social skills for the sake of a mission – many of the common roles they had to play varied from the part of a cunning politician secretly trying to secure the best deals in a treaty, to a harmless and stupid servant meant to be ignored by all those of importance.

Kakashi shrugged. "Don't want word getting out that I don't have the Sharingan anymore. People might use that as an excuse to risk targeting me more often, and you never know when one of them might actually get lucky."

Jiraiya nodded. "Makes sense."

 _Too much sense._

Things rarely worked out so perfectly, at least, not when the universe tended to screw itself up on a regular basis. The fact was, Jiraiya wouldn't be the amazing ninja everyone knew he was if he couldn't spot these little tells. Kakashi was keeping his eye – not really his eye – closed because he was a little imbecile who was still punishing himself for something that had happened more than ten years ago.

People sometimes called _him_ a sentimental old bastard; hell, people sometimes called his _teacher_ a sentimental old bastard. But in the end, it was Kakashi who topped them all, because at least Jiraiya didn't blind himself in one eye on purpose all because of some screwed-up guilt complex over a long-dead friend…

…It was too early for this crap.

If only he could just ditch the mission and go on a bordello run like he normally did every time he was feeling mildly bored. Because his entire life up until this point was centered around – well, nothing, really − Jiraiya had been free to set his own schedule. The "missions" the Sandaime gave him usually weren't things with specifically labeled and assigned parameters or rankings; they were simply questions asking "what are so-and-so planning" or "how is so-and-so doing". Basic stuff that required lots of skill but no immediate answers.

Unfortunately, this mission was actually a time-sensitive one, and given how pissed Kakashi seemed to be over the whole Orochimaru business, Jiraiya really did _not_ want to be put in the same list as his old teammate.

Not that he couldn't take care of himself if Kakashi really decided to try to screw him over, but there was no reason in making his own life harder than it already was.

Contrary to popular belief, Jiraiya wasn't that type of stupid person who liked running after trouble for the sake of it (well, maybe if there were enough pretty girls involved, but not if it would cost him his life, was his point). He hadn't survived for so long by being completely reckless all the time.

Just _some_ of the time.

"Oh, and by the way…"

Jiraiya raised an eyebrow. "What?"

"Remember that time with the dogs and the toads – "

"CAN WE _NOT_?"

* * *

 **A/N:** **On another note, what's the cutest animal you can think of that's actually really scary?**


	23. The Snakepit

BONUS #18

A deleted scene from Chapter 22 has been posted on the forum.

* * *

 _The Land of Hot Water_

"Give it a rest, Kakashi," Jiraiya sighed, poking at the remains of their fire.

"No," Kakashi insisted, only to fall flat on his back as soon as the word had left his mouth.

"If you hurt yourself, I'm not going to carry you," Jiraiya warned, with all the tone one would use for a particularly stubborn five-year-old.

Kakashi shot him the nastiest look he could muster in his currently undignified state, and then returned to glaring at the tree. It wasn't as if the tree had done anything to him; he just needed something to take out his frustrations on. He'd thought he'd put his pride away the day Obito was crushed under that rock, but apparently some vestiges of his former arrogance still remained.

He had a reputation, after all. One of the village's elite Jonin could hardly be expected to allow trivial issues to bother him.

But this wasn't trivial at all, was it? Going from a skill level he'd worked years to achieve back down to pre-Academy level in less than a fortnight – it wasn't the nicest feeling. The life of a shinobi was all that he'd ever had since he was born, all he'd ever been good at, and now it was being taken away from him.

 _There's a third way out_ , he tried to remind himself.

 _What third way is there, when your own body won't even cooperate?_ the blemished surface of the tree trunk seemed to mock him. The tattered spots of bark were his marks of failure, a testament to his failed attempts at climbing a simple _tree_ – _I am Hatake Kakashi, one of the suppsedly best ninja from the Village Hidden in the_ Leaves _, and I can't even climb a tree._

Now that was just embarrassing.

After all the trouble Ino had gone through to reassure him, it made him feel guilty that he was still surrounding himself in negativity. He felt like an angsty teenager again. The wounded pride, the resurfacing insecurity, the fear of failure.

"I haven't seen Tsunade since I was a kid," Kakashi said out loud, forgoing the honorific because he was feeling too lazy and apathetic right now to bother. It wasn't as if she was here to hear him. "I hope she's still as skilled as everyone makes her out to be."

Not the nicest statement to make about Jiraiya's old teammate, but at least there was the word "hope" in it, so that had to count for something, right?

Jiraiya saw him look at himself in the polished surface of his kunai, still stabbed into the tree at a painfully low elevation, and thankfully chose to say nothing.

* * *

 _Konoha Central Hospital_

"Your full recovery is complete," the medic-nin told me. "You're free to resume training."

 _Finally_ , I groused to myself. "Those are the five best words I've heard all week."

"Don't push yourself too hard," he warned, "or I'll be seeing you again."

An empty threat, I knew. I wasn't going to get chakra exhaustion from training at home. The thing with Orochimaru had been a one-time deal. My muscles still felt slightly atrophied, but that might have been just a matter of my own perception, and resting more was only going to make it worse. I had already wasted enough time as it was, though I did not regret meeting Izumo and the Konohamaru Corps.

"Of course," I replied, knowing it was just easier to respond to the doctors of Konoha with politeness, regardless of whether or not I was actually going to follow their advice. As soon as I had cleared his range of observation, I immediately took to the rooftops and ran as fast as I could back to my clan's training grounds.

Despite all the crap we'd just been through, it was a wonderful time to be alive. Hearing the wind rushing by my ears – leaping from rooftop to rooftop – feeling the sun on my face – it sounded cheesy, but this chakra-propelled running and jumping was the closest thing a non-Wind user could get to flying. I hadn't known how much I'd miss this feeling until my injuries had confined me to inaction for all this time.

But now I had my freedom back, and that was the most wonderful thing in the world.

I spent the rest of the day just doing whatever the heck I wanted to do. Throwing kunai. Practicing my elemental transformations. Water walking, taijutsu forms, checking up on Naruto and Ino, poking around in the mission rooms with the other Chunin. Even chasing the deer and climbing the tallest tree in the forest to get a better view of Konoha, like I used to do when I was a kid.

(Did we still count as kids? I had to wonder.)

I hadn't felt so relaxed in a long, long time. This reminded me of those days, back when all I ever had to worry about in the world was how well my training was going.

Maybe ignorance was bliss, after all.

But it was too late to go back there, now. I had already taken my first step into the world, and there was no going back. The only way to move was forward.

What had been seen could not be unseen, and no, I was not just talking about Gai-sensei.

That thought sobered me, and my brain forced me back into thinking mode again. I could never stay relaxed for long. One of the annoying things about being, well, _me_. I couldn't _not_ think. Thinking was just who I _was_.

 _Izumo and Kotetsu. The Konohamaru Corps. The Councilman. The Hokage. Kakashi-sensei. Kumogakure. Sunagakure. The Ichibi. Orochimaru._ They all flittered across my mind, oddly connected and annoyingly out of reach, following me throughout the rest of the day, never giving me a moment's rest. Even dinnertime brought me no relief; in fact, it only made things worse, because that was also my father's thinking time.

"…anyway, I don't know how much time we have. The guys in ANBU were desperate enough to go to me – _me_ – for advice. I'm the Jonin Commander; my strengths lie in war strategy and arranging troops. Not…curse seals."

"So what did you tell them?" my mother asked.

"I just told them to wait for Jiraiya to come home from his mission."

"What else are you planning to do against that man, then?" my mother demanded.

"Like I said, we're waiting for Jiraiya's advice."

That caught my attention.

 _Jiraiya. Orochimaru. Kakashi-sensei._

Aha. So they were stuck, too.

 _"Maybe I could help – "_

…is what I would have liked to suggest.

But I stopped myself before I could. When it came to strategy, or troop divisions, I was his go-to sounding board. Orochimaru? I didn't know the exact details, but from what I had picked up from Kakashi-sensei, this wasn't something he would be willing to discuss in private, let alone at the table.

My father turned to me. "Shikamaru? You're awfully quiet."

 _He knows me too well. If I expressed interest, he'd get suspicious if he turned me down and I responded by doing nothing._

I shrugged. "Sometimes, patience is all we have. It would be smarter to take advantage of his absence to figure something out, instead of wasting time and putting lives in danger trying to hunt him down. I'm not worried about him as much as I am about my friends. We have a whole department working on Orochimaru, but in Team 7, we're responsible for ourselves."

 _Of course, taking care of ourselves involves taking care of Orochimaru._

The lie spilled off my tongue like water, and I was surprised at how easily it came to me. I was even more surprised when I saw my father nod and turn back to his meal.

 _If only it were as simple as sending my father out with his secret technique. But it's not exactly something we can make public knowledge, nor is it something we can teach to everyone who might potentially come into contact with Orochimaru._

Maybe he was just pretending to believe me. More likely, however, he had chosen to accept my words because I had never tried to outright lie to him before, not like this. I had phrased my response not as an answer, but as advice, and every time I had given my father advice it had been solid. The same was true here; even though my intentions were misleading, there was nothing wrong with the statement itself.

My father was intelligent, but he wasn't perfect. Just as my Jonin sensei was not all-powerful. Just as the Hokage was not all-knowing.

They all outmatched me, but that didn't matter as long as I settled myself within the gaps in their skills. A good offense could pick any number of foci at random; a good defense had to cover all of them.

This had nothing to do with revenge, of course. I would not lie to my father about something selfish like that. This was simply…self-preservation. Though Orochimaru had caused many people a good deal of grief, I wasn't about to go out of my way to return the suffering. I just needed to eliminate his ability to continue causing us pain. If that meant holding hands and singing Kumbaya with him, I'd do it, but of course that was no longer an option, if it ever was.

I didn't want to be one of _those_ people who fancied themselves good enough to judge the worth of others' lives, because I _wasn't_ one of those people. It was just…there were certain individuals who simply could not coexist with others, that's all. And I could safely say Orochimaru was one of those people.

 _My team. And Choji's team, too. This is for them._

Though the Hokage had reassured me that his insane former student wasn't capable of doing anything in his current state, I still couldn't rest easy. After all, we had both thought that Jiraiya would be capable of fixing Kakashi-sensei, and we had both ended up wrong.

I had to talk to Ino. Or her father. Maybe they would – no. No, bad idea. I couldn't let anything be traced back to them, and anything I asked them would make its way back to my father anyway. Besides, Ino's father was already occupied with a different psychopath. Not to mention, they were in the middle of training for the Chunin Exam finals. I couldn't expect them to put everything down to deal with my problems.

For the first time since the second task had ended I was starting to feel like driftwood. Floating around without companionship. Kakashi-sensei was gone, Ino was training with her father, and Naruto was probably pranking that poor ANBU friend of Kakashi-sensei's to death. Logically, it was an unreasonable sentiment – I had my family, and Naruto and Ino didn't take up the whole day training. Team 7 still had plenty of time to regularly meet and talk.

But there was that little ice cube of doubt hiding behind my brain, hissing, _You can talk to them all you like, but you know they don't truly understand the concerns you have to face._

The worst part of that was, it was true. I could probably make them understand, but…I didn't want to. Giving them a heads-up about danger was enough. I could shoulder the rest of the stress involving central command, because I had chosen to go wandering into that territory. It wasn't right to make Naruto and Ino do the same.

This was – slightly scary – quite concerning, actually – but I'd be a sorry excuse for a person if I gave up just because of that.

* * *

 _Dangoya_

Anko spat the dango stick at the wall, where it embedded itself perfectly between the panels. "Ha!" she crowed. "I win!"

Genma scowled, but he knew better than to try to skip out on her. "If we had been using actual senbon, I would have won," he pointed out, reaching into his pocket for his crumpled wallet.

"Well, the bet was on dango sticks, so pay up, loser," she snapped, holding out her hand. Genma shoved the bills into her palm with a good-natured grunt, and stalked away. "Smell ya later!"

"Whatever, Mitarashi," Genma yelled back.

Anko leaned back in her chair with a grin, intending to spend the rest of the day planning how to best use her ill-gotten income, only to have someone catch the bench and force it back upright again. She whipped her arm around instinctively, expecting whoever was behind her to respond with a pained grunt, but all she caught was air.

Her confusion quickly turned back into ire when she realized that her missed target was only a boy who couldn't have been more than twelve or thirteen. He had a forehead protector, but no other distinguishing attributes. A Genin, then, and a Nara by the look of his face.

"I know you," she growled. "You're that other annoying little shit on Hatake's team." The first one, of course, being Hatake himself.

"I'm flattered that you think so much of me," he deadpanned, "and I apologize for interrupting your fun, but this really is important."

"Direct, aren't you." Anko crossed her arms.

"You're a direct person," he shot back.

"Fair enough. Now what could be so important that a kid like you would approach an amazing, sexy ninja like me?" Anko leaned forward and let her coat slip open around her chest.

But the boy didn't react. Not even stuttering, or an outraged order to cover up, like the last Hyuga she'd done it to had done.

 _Now, that's no fun,_ she whined internally. _This normally works…at the very least, a downward glance and blush…_

Either he hadn't hit puberty yet, or he was like his teacher. She meant that in terms of "emotionally challenged brick," of course.

"I'm a bit preoccupied with more important things," he told her. "Specifically, Orochimaru."

And just like that, Anko's good mood soured like week-old curdled milk.

 _God damn._

She stabbed the remains of her dango stick into the table. "I don't want to talk about it. Get the hell out of here."

But the brat didn't budge. "Do you _want_ to be indirectly responsible for the death of a fellow Konoha nin? We are – "

"Don't try to guilt trip me into anything. I'm already way beyond that, kid." In truth, she wasn't, not really. The Hokage had already briefed her about the situation, and Ibiki had filled in the rest of the details. What more was there to know?

"My team nearly got killed because of him," Nara-brat insisted. " _You_ nearly got killed because of him. So now we have a common goal."

"Join the conga line. There's a million people in the world who want him dead." She reached out and pinched him as hard as she could between his neck and shoulder, and to his credit, he only winced slightly. "I know the Hokage's trying to keep your precious little teacher's injuries a secret, but I'm assuming you're one of the few in the loop, along with Ibiki and me. Aren't you?"

"Yes."

"Then you should also know to stay out of this, if you know what's good for you." She flashed him her scariest grin.

"I've felt Orochimaru's killer intent. Stop trying to intimidate me," he snapped. "As for your lovely advice, I'd stay out of it if I could, but the way the truth stands, I'm already in too deep to leave. Being ignorant of the facts is more likely to hurt than help me at this point. Sasuke Uchiha is his goal, and my team is an obstacle. All I need from you are more details on _how_ the hell he's still alive, since everyone else is too squeamish to. No strings attached. Just give me those answers, in full detail, so I know exactly what I'm dealing with, and I'll leave you alone."

"What, you plan to go after him?" Anko asked. "You think you can kill him?"

"No to the first question, maybe to the second one. I like living, thank you very much. There's a difference between courting danger and putting it down if it arrives. Besides, we took him down before," he pointed out.

Shit, that was right. She'd forgotten. With all the drama involving Hatake, few had bothered to figure out what the shadow-thing he'd done even was. "This is an uncomfortable situation for me, you realize."

"It'll be uncomfortable for me, too. Then we'll be even."

Anko thought about how little everything else seemed to faze him, and then shrugged. Why not give this one a go.

So she told him. All the gory details, just like he asked. The flashes of fluorescent lights, the metal exam tables, the rows and rows of children floating inside bubbling tanks. _The needles. Possession. The smell of death, everywhere._ How, in the end, body after body would wake up with yellowed eyes and a snakelike smile, and then they would know, that original person was dead. And in the meantime, all those lucky enough to survive the curse…

"From what I've heard, your sensei's mark has been sealed away," she said. "Meanwhile, mine was an earlier experiment, so he hadn't thought to turn them into little backup copies of himself yet. But otherwise…we can't kill him. That's all. Now how's your lunch holding up?"

He was good at keeping his cool, but not that good, yet. Even in the dim light she could see his carefully constructed poker face was paler than it used to be.

"I'll be fine."

"Well? Now what? Are you still thinking yourself good enough to take him on?" She leaned her elbow on the table and shot him her nastiest smirk.

He responded by slowly pulling his feet up onto the chair and folding his hands in his lap.

There were a million better things she had to do today than watch a twelve-year-old kid sit there meditating, and yet observing him was too fascinating for her to just _leave_.

He must have sat there for all of five minutes before he jerked upwards and replied, "I have an idea – oh, wait, I'm sorry. _You_ have an idea."

Her eyebrows disappeared beneath her bangs. "Really."

" _Really._ And the next time you see the Hokage, you will _drop this hint to him_. And he will _accept without doubt_ that it came from you. And then you will _keep me updated_ on whatever progress is being made after that. Simple enough?"

"You really expect me to do that for you?" she drawled, unimpressed.

"I do not expect you to do that for _me_. I expect you to do that because you want to get rid of Orochimaru, and my idea is one step towards that."

"Oh, how cute," Anko crooned. "Little baby Genin is trying to help."

"Yes. Little baby Genin _is_ trying to help. And he's going to be fucking help _ful_ , if you would just give him a chance."

Anko pinched the bridge of her nose. "Fine, then. What's your brilliant idea on killing a guy who's done everything to ensure he can't be killed?"

"Who said I was going to kill him?"

"…What?"

Here, despite looking very, very ill, he gave her a thin smile anyway. "When there's a problem you can't solve, pick a different one to figure out. I understand that the best minds in ANBU research are currently going crazy trying to figure out how to keep him dead. I'm proposing a fresh perspective: as long as he's not dead, he can't be revived."

Anko snorted. " _That's_ your brilliant plan? Capture him alive? He's evaded us for years. His whole schtick is built on his ability to avoid people."

"That was before. But now we have an advantage. We know what he wants. As long as Sasuke Uchiha lives, he'll keep coming back."

"You're going to use one of your classmates as bait?"

"He's a target regardless. Better to be bait than a prisoner."

"Then how do you plan to keep him imprisoned? He'll escape out of whatever cell we try to put him in – and probably kill a dozen guards and important dignitaries in the process."

"Technically," the brat interrupted her, "someone without a fully functional brain can still be considered 'alive' if their heart is beating, and last time I checked, vegetables were not very good at escaping anything."

Anko felt the room drop about five degrees in temperature.

She opened her mouth to speak – then shut it again. Then opened her mouth – no, nope.

What the hell.

No.

Just no.

…Okay, fuck, this kid was _good._

Fine, whatever. This round went to him, but she was _not_ about to let this little kid win in a battle of creep-outs. So he was young and inexperienced; she'd give him that bit of leeway. But he was nowhere near her talent for brutality yet.

Too clinical. Too logical. Not enough crazy. Plus, the look in his eyes gave him away. His whole face was way too frozen to be natural. She could tell, quite obviously, that he was only saying these things to get a reaction out of her, to get her to acknowledge him as a useful ally, not because he truly believed in them.

Well, if he couldn't put his money where his mouth was, then no dice for him.

"That sounds like a perfectly humane and reasonable mode of action," she hissed playfully, returning his glare. _Your turn, little one._ "You really think you're up to it?"

"He tried to cut through me to enslave another one of my classmates – and because of that, my teacher can't use any ninjutsu for at least half a year, if ever again," baby-Nara declared, his tone a great deal less vehement than his choice of wording would suggest. "You'll have to forgive me for being a little more than pissed off about this than I act in front of the general public. If he didn't want to take responsibility for his actions, he shouldn't have messed with my team in the first place. The Hokage has made excuses for him for far too long."

"Hmmm…I don't know…" Anko grinned.

She was goading him, and he knew that. But he also knew they couldn't proceed until he responded to her bait. Something as important as this needed utter conviction. She couldn't just let him talk smack for the sake of talking smack, only to back out at the perfect moment to make an even bigger mess of things. Because that was what happened when people came up with good plans and then didn't follow through. Bad plans failing – well, that was expected. But good plans abandoned near completion, and you might as well be taking the main support beam from the Hokage tower.

He glared at her. "His existence was forfeit the day he laid a finger on my friends."

Unlike his previous statements, however, this one was much more convincing. And, to Anko's slight shock, she found herself actually believing it. It had taken her years to master the art of the face, and yet here he was, one conversation in…

Was he faking this one, too?

No. No, he wasn't. The earlier, more gruesome stuff involving her deranged ex-teacher, sure. The things involving his comrades? No. It was admirable, this unerring loyalty, but there was a hint of obsessiveness underneath the surface that worried her. Nothing too major – everyone she knew had that patch of darkness within them.

Except the kid was _twelve_.

Her first instinct was to blame Kakashi Hatake, but something else told her that this was all on him and him alone.

He was still speaking. "It's the least costly and most efficient way of dealing with him. And as you said, since the curse seals are bound to the main body, it'll also solve the problem of breaking his control over the surviving test subjects. Obviously, I don't have sufficient technical knowledge to give you full details. It's up to ANBU Research to figure out whether operating directly on his frontal lobe or sealing away all of his memories would be more permanent, and a way to potentially use each in a confrontation."

Anko whistled.

"…You're right. That _is_ a good idea."

"Told you. So do we have a deal?"

"What?"

"Well, obviously, the 'little baby Genin', doesn't have direct access to the anti-Orochimaru committee, even though he could be really useful, because innocent little baby Genin aren't _supposed_ to be getting involved in this stuff without getting put on fifty different psychological watchlists. So I'm asking you to be my…middleman, of sorts. I get to help, you get to pass off my good ideas as yours, Konoha has an extra mind working on the Orochimaru case, and everyone wins." He leaned back, surprisingly smugly for someone who looked like he was about to throw up five minutes ago.

Anko's mind raced. On one hand, his offer was insanely appealing. On the other hand…

"You say you're doing this to help?" she asked.

"Yes. Of course. This isn't just about me. My friends – "

"Are you saying that to convince me, or yourself?"

"Does it matter?"

 _Yes it fucking does, you little shit._

Anko grabbed his face and dug her nails into his cheeks, painful enough to grab his attention but not hard enough to leave a bruise. "Okay, brat. I'm asking you this because for whatever reason I've decided to put a little faith into you. I know you're a smart boy. Everyone and their third cousin knows that.

"But listen to me, and listen to me carefully. I know you're uncomfortable with this. Very uncomfortable. I can see it in you. Don't – listen to me!" she growled, gripping his chin harder. "I think it's clear I can trust you to get shit done. So that problem is out of the way. Now I need to be able to trust you to not go too far.

"You feel this disgust? Savor it. Only do what you have to. No more, no less. Orochimaru forgot how to feel disgust, and look where that got him. A disgusting pile of human scum.

"You don't want to hurt him out of revenge, because you're too smart for that. You just want to make sure he's no longer a threat, and the most reliable choice of action you've come up with happens to be a painful one. And I agree. I agree with you completely. I can't stand those bright and sunny good-for-nothing comic-book heroes, believing everyone is redeemable and deserving of forgiveness.

"So I'll do as you asked. I'll pass this off as my plan, because you're right; it's probably closer to working than what we have now, and my reputation as Creepy Mitarashi is already at the point where no one will care if I take the hit – unlike you, boy. But this is all UNDER THE CONDITION that you don't involve yourself any further than what I give you. No! Shut up! I mean it!" she snapped, seeing his attempt to protest. "You know what's going on. You've done your part. Now trust that we'll do ours, and _leave it be._

"You have to understand, you can't pull shit like this all the time. You can't let this consume you. You can't hide behind my skirts forever. One day, you're going to have to take responsibility for your own ideas, normal _or_ fucked-up. Orochimaru's already dragged too many other people down to his level. You absolutely can _not_ let him do the same to you. Capice?"

He nodded mutely.

"Good," Anko breathed, and she felt herself soften for him, just a bit. "Now scram, brat. I've got things to do and time to waste. None of which involve you."

He nodded, gave her a lazy salute, sharply pivoted on his heel and disappeared. Anko watched him go in silence.

* * *

 **A/N: A big thank you to all of my reviewers so far. The past few weeks have been majorly stressful for me, so all of your support has been really helpful in keeping me motivated.**


	24. Crescendo

_The Gamblers' Den_

As soon as those two familiar figures entered the room, Tsunade knew that her old teacher had caught up with her at last. And, unlike those other times she had run into still-loyal Konoha shinobi, he actually meant business this time around. Seemed like he was no longer willing to allow her to indulge in her sorrows.

That didn't mean she wasn't going to fight it all the same. Not that she had much to fight _with_ , other than some empty bottles of rice wine and a deck of cards.

Eh, what the hell. She threw the bottle at Jiraiya, knowing he'd catch it. "Go away."

"That's her, all right," Kakashi quipped.

Jiraiya twitched his upper lip. "Thank genetics for your nose."

"Cripes," Tsunade mumbled. "Can't a woman just live in peace?"

"Nope," Kakashi said cheerfully.

Tsunade stared at him, over to Jiraiya, and back to him again. She could have sworn she had covered her tracks well. Tsunade swore under her breath. Stupid dog-nosed ex-ANBU trackers...

"Shizune didn't, though," Kakashi grinned, as if reading her mind.

She knew this day had been coming, but damn, she didn't _want_ to go back to Konoha. All the lies and anger – she couldn't take it. Tsunade glared at Shizune, who shrugged at her innocently. _Pah. Liar._ Shizune must have noticed Jiraiya and company on her trail, and purposely helped them find her.

 _Traitor! I trusted you!_

Shizune simply responded to that with an insolent little smirk. It didn't help her case that Shizune genuinely _did_ know what was better for her than she did herself, sometimes. Since when had someone half her age become better at taking care of her than she could take care of herself? It was embarrassingly pathetic, to be honest.

"And I suppose you're going to tell me a bunch of sappy reasons on why I should return to Konoha?" she asked. "Let me guess. Blah blah blah Will of Fire blah the Leaf needs you and your old teacher misses you blah blah blah and also some girl wants to be an amazing medic nin just like you and you _have_ to come back so she has a proper teacher because she's like the most talented little thing in the world and it would be a shame for it all to go to waste?"

"Well, no…"

"How about 'It's your grandfather's village and you ought to return'?"

"…No?"

"'You're wasting your life away with all this gambling and drinking,' then."

"Nope."

"Then for god's sake, what is it?"

"Well," Kakashi scratched the back of his head, "I think I met some old friends of yours, and they really want to see you. I thought I'd lead them here to convince you instead."

"That's it?" Tsunade snorted. "Please. That's even lamer than the other ones. Get out of here. I don't _have_ friends. They're all dead."

"Thanks," Jiraiya said dryly.

"I actually think you do," Kakashi said. "No, I mean, they really, _really_ want to see you. They _expressly_ wished that we find you. And there's a lot of them, too. They're all waiting right there for you, actually."

Tsunade narrowed her eyes, peering out the window, and dropped her cup of sake. There was a loud clatter, and every single head in the bar swiveled over to the source of the noise as the cloudy liquid dribbled over the ground and slid between the cracks in the wooden floorboards.

Debt collectors. At least twenty of them.

All standing outside the door.

Now, Tsunade knew that she'd be able to punch her way through the lot of them if she really wanted to, but the entire place was watching her now, and it would be a tad inconvenient if someone witnessed her attack all of those civilians. And she knew that if Kakashi and Jiraiya found her now, they'd be able to find her again, and they (well, Kakashi) might just lead those debt collectors to her, again and again and again…

"You little bastard…" she hissed.

"Actually, my parents were married," Kakashi said, his impish grin uncharacteristically bright in comparison to the rest of his surroundings. Jiraiya was making the universal hand sign for _please don't kill me._

"Still the same as ever, I see," Tsunade muttered, pouring herself a new cup of sake as Jiraiya quickly cast a genjutsu for privacy. She had woken up in a particularly foul mood today and this little surprise party had _not_ helped. How she really wanted to bash that little brat's skull in. "Fine. What do you want?"

Kakashi got straight to the point. "If you come back to Konoha, we'll settle your debts."

That caught her attention. "You would?"

"Yes. All of them."

She narrowed her eyes. "What's the catch?"

"Like I said, you returning to Konoha. That's all. You come back willingly, and we pay your debts, allow you to retake your position at the hospital, and pretend your absence was all a result of a long training sabbatical, funded by Konoha."

"What if I still say no?" Tsunade asked.

"Then you will be branded as a missing-nin and we will have to take appropriate action." He took a step forward. "We can do this the easy way or the hard way. Your choice."

"Are you _threatening_ me?"

"Maybe?" Kakashi said, and oh, she could just _see_ the smirk under the mask. "I'm still trying to figure out the difference between blackmail and extortion."

Tsunade stood up, fists ready to strike. Kakashi drew a kunai. Jiraiya looked horrified.

"Are you going to challenge me to a battle of strength?" she hissed.

"No, I'm not _that_ crazy," Kakashi said.

 _That's right, bitch,_ Tsunade thought with a hint of pride _._

"But I _am_ crazy enough to do _this_ ," Kakashi added, and to her horrified surprise, turned his knife inwards so that the blade touched himself.

Tsunade froze.

 _Shit_.

Memories of bloodied bodies and dead lovers danced across her blackening vision. The smell of alcohol grew stronger, and the sounds of wars past deafened her ears. Then the nightmares cleared, and she was back in the present time, still facing a distinctly bloodless Kakashi, still posed with his weapon hovering dangerously close to his own flesh.

She turned to Jiraiya challengingly, only to falter when she realized just how _tired_ he looked. Not the "I have a hangover and it's too early for me to be up" tired. More like the "I've just been through hell and back to deliver to you the worst news in the world and you won't like what I have to say and I know you won't like what I have to say but I am going to have to tell you anyway even though I really, really don't want to tell you because it's extremely important" sort of tired.

Great.

"We _do_ need you in Konoha, Tsunade," Jiraiya sighed, placatingly.

"If you please, Tsunade-sama," Kakashi added, as if he was some sort of butler instead of the shitiest little shite to walk the earth. "The Sandaime's patience wears thinner every day."

 _Oh, so it was Tsunade-_ sama _, now, was it?_ Tsunade thought bitterly at being outmaneuvered by a brat one whole generation her younger – but the prospect of having all her debts settled was a very appealing one. Just enough to put aside her pride. _I didn't know he had so much money saved up. But I suppose that's what happens when you spend ten years doing S-ranks while living like a beggar. Well, money makes the world go round, doesn't it, or the shinobi villages wouldn't even exist in the first place._

"He wouldn't hurt me," Tsunade insisted. He'd left her alone up until now, after all.

"Oh, I don't know about that," Jiraiya said softly. "Sensei hasn't been the sensei we knew for a long time. He's a changed man, Tsunade. He's…hardened. All those decades of leading a ninja village instead of staying home with his grandkids…it's taken a worse toll on him than I thought. Not just his health. His entire attitude, it's…"

Jiraiya didn't continue. Tsunade didn't bother to ask. She doubted she'd be able to understand until she saw it for herself.

"I can't be a medic anymore. I break down at the sight of blood – I just – I just can't," she whimpered, feeling as useless as she was the day she tried to heal Dan's dead body.

"Get therapy," Kakashi suggested, and in that moment Tsunade wanted nothing more than to wallop some manners into Sakumo's still-socially-inept-twenty-years-later whelp.

"So why exactly, do you need me so badly?" Tsunade shot back, still feigning reluctance. It didn't matter if she was on the disadvantaged side in this bargain – she could still get a slightly better deal if she made all the right moves. Luckily, she was a much better negotiator than she was a gambler, for there wasn't so much luck involved as there was skill.

Kakashi glared at her. Tsunade ignored him. There were many things that still affected her, but the annoyance of other people wasn't one of them. Least of all the annoyance of someone who was normally the one annoying others.

"I don't know if you've heard, but Orochimaru returned. He attempted an attack."

"Orochimaru?" Tsunade asked, trying not to let anything show on her face. Unfortunately, she didn't succeed, and belatedly realized that even now, decades later, when she thought she had already forgotten everything, her old teammate still had his icy cold claws wrapped around her neck. She couldn't believe she'd once had a _crush_ on him – it was – ugh. So disgusting. She needed more alcohol. Alcohol was a natural cleanser, right?

"He's gone for now, but he left behind many backup plans to allow himself to return to life," Jiraiya explained. "Curse seals, Tsunade. He was experimenting with curse seals, and he finally managed to perfect them."

Tsunade bit her lip, trying not to imagine what Orochimaru must have done in order to achieve such knowledge. "As in – but how – "

"Nasty business. Human experiments. Kidnapping little kids. All sorts of things," Jiraiya sighed. "Messing around with his own consciousness, even."

"I don't know anything about sealing," Tsunade mumbled, trying not to get sick. On second thought, maybe she shouldn't have drunk too much rice wine before noon. "Okay, well, enough. But not at the level of breaking curse seals. What do you need me for?"

Kakashi tiredly raised his left arm. "Individually tailored seals, Tsunade-sama. I took one that wasn't meant for me. You can guess the resulting damage to my chakra system."

Tsunade grimaced. Chakra injuries were always the worst, even for her. Most of the time, they weren't exactly lethal if there was a healer on hand who knew what he or she was doing, but combined with terrible (terrible as in Orochimaru terrible, not terrible as in poorly done) seal work, they could very well end up crippling the victim for life. Bad news for a ninjutsu specialist like Kakashi. Bad news for an _anything_ specialist, really. Even taijutsu-based ninja who didn't need to expel chakra still needed chakra cycling underneath to augment their power.

With a practiced hand, Tsunade lifted the appendage. Though she had no special dojutsu, she could still easily sense the heavy damage beneath his skin. It wasn't the worst she had ever seen – but it _was_ pretty close.

"You say Orochimaru did this?" she asked.

"The little idiot, as we said before, jumped in the way of a curse seal that had been prepared for a completely different person with an incompatible set of chakra pathways," Jiraiya explained. "The seal was trying to take him over; his body reacted accordingly. The result burnt over this entire area."

"And you blocked all of that portion off?" Tsunade asked, feeling for the telltale presence of a chakra inhibitor. She found it soon enough. It was well done, thankfully, though she expected nothing less from Jiraiya. Just because he was a pervert didn't mean he was stupid.

"Had to. The curse seal – Orochimaru – needs time to die. The only way I could do it was starving it of chakra with trap gates and inhibitors," Jiraiya shrugged.

"I see," Tsunade muttered. She sighed. The chakra inhibitors were the only things keeping Kakashi alive at this point, so she couldn't touch them at all. But the same chakra inhibitors were also what prevented her from doing anything more to help Kakashi's arm. "I can't even touch your burnt tenketsu until after Jiraiya gives me the all-clear on the curse mark."

"What about after?"

"After that…well, I might be able to restore partial use to your original pathways, or grow new pathways around them. Either way, they won't be as efficient as they once were. The Sharingan's barely on the border of the blocked region, so that has a better chance of getting back to working condition, but no promises. Speaking of which, without chakra, it's just acting like a normal eye, so why don't you uncover it?"

Kakashi shook his head. "I can't. One, we're trying to keep my injuries private knowledge, here, and two, I just…can't. I have to remember. Even if the eye is not receiving any chakra, it's still no normal eye."

Tsunade bit her lip. She understood.

Many times, in her darkest hours, she had considered destroying her grandfather's necklace. She had wanted to break it, to burn it, to throw it away, just so it would stop reminding her of all the things she had left behind and all the people she had lost. But in the end, she couldn't do it. So here she was now – still clinging to the very things that held her back, because for all the sorrow it brought her, she'd be lost without it there.

"I can't do anything more. Sorry."

Kakashi blinked, and nodded. "I understand. Thank you, Tsunade-sama."

Tsunade was no Yamanaka, but she could read Kakashi's thoughts, for they were flying across his single exposed eye so obviously right now that it wasn't even funny.

 _A ninjutsu master without hand seals is completely worthless._

 _I am defenseless – helpless – useless – dedicated my life to this field, and now it's all gone – and not even the world's greatest healer can bring it back completely – what am I going to do – I am nothing_ _–_

"Hey – kid – don't look so down," Jiraiya said, clapping Kakashi on the back. "You'll figure something out."

Kakashi twirled a kunai contemplatively. "Yes, I suppose I will, won't I?"

It wasn't so much a compliment to Kakashi's tenacity as much of a warning that if he _didn't_ figure something out, he was pretty much doomed. A lesser shinobi might have gotten away with something like this, especially if he was an especially efficient office drone. But Kakashi had already made too much of a name for himself. If any word got out that the Copy-Nin was now without chakra, people who were normally too afraid to approach him would now be more willing to test their chances. Due to his past accomplishments alone, even a sharp decrease in power wouldn't lower the price on his head significantly, simply due to the vast amount of people out there still wanting their revenge.

Evidently, both Jiraiya and Kakashi knew this, otherwise they wouldn't have come to see her. Seeing as she had spent the past several years putting up this wall of apathy around herself, Tsunade was more disappointed than she should have been for not being able to help him any more. Then again, she had never been able to properly _hate_ , no matter how much she tried to convince herself that she could. If only caring so much about other people didn't always consistently let her down. Her luck was just shit like that.

"On the bright side, your muscle and bone shouldn't be affected by any of this, so you'll still be able to practice with weapons and other physical skills. No amputation; that's the biggest relief. If you like, I can also make you a chakra sink to put on your right arm, so both sides of you will be balanced. There won't be any chakra flowing to either of your arms, then, but at least you'll regain your chakra control. Enough to water-walk and perform any jutsu you've used enough times to perform without hand seals."

As soon as the words left her mouth, Tsunade immediately regretted her offer. _Why, why, WHY did I say that?_ Now that she'd said it, she'd be obliged to help. There was nothing stopping her from just strolling out and punching everyone who tried to stop her into next Thursday…except for bad publicity…

Except she couldn't; not really.

Because the renewed look of hope on Kakashi's face was just…that worth it…

See, she could still help people…make the world a better place…

Curse her healer's soul.

"It's not as if you could have used hand seals with only one good arm, anyway…" she added.

" − Thank you for your time, Tsunade-sama. I'll talk to the men outside now. Have a nice day," Kakashi said quickly. And then, his personality did a perfect 180 degree turn yet again, and he had pasted that empty smile on his face to go out to charm the debt collectors with.

Tsunade stared at his retreating back as she swirled her sake.

 _Look at him, Tsunade,_ the annoying voice in the back of her mind said. _He's still fighting. He's lost everyone he's ever loved, and now he's lost ninjutsu, one of the few things he still enjoys. And he's still fighting._

 _Oh, yeah?_ Tsunade shot back, clenching her fist around her cup. _Well, so am I. Really, what's the difference between going around annoying people and getting drunk?_

Tsunade wasn't a washout. She _wasn't_. She had abandoned Konoha, yes, and looking back, that was a pretty crappy thing of her to do. But she hadn't abandoned medicine. She hadn't abandoned her healer's oath.

And try as she might, her shinobi past refused to abandon _her_.

So there she was. Even after all those years of drinking and gambling, her healing skills hadn't faded. Even after all those years of swearing to abandon the shinobi life, she was coming back to Konoha, finally.

She owed Sakumo this one thing, at the very least.

* * *

 _ANBU Containment Complex 32-West_

Gaara dragged his fingers down the clear plastic panels and pretended that the irritating squeaking noise was someone screaming.

If only he had taken that giant toad seriously when it first came. Then he wouldn't have been stuck here in the first place. He could have escaped – run away – somewhere far from either Suna or Konoha – where he could kill as he pleased.

There was no running here. The strange new seals all around the room and on his chest made sure of that.

All his life, Gaara had known he was hated. He just hadn't known how _much_ they'd hated him.

He'd thought – they had been planning an invasion of the Leaf, and they'd told him, _promised_ him, that he could get as much blood as he wanted here, if only he listened to them and held off until the date of the attack.

He should have known it was all a lie. Just like his uncle, pretending to love him. All of it, a lie. Lies, lies, LIES! THEY WERE LIARS AND MONSTERS JUST LIKE HIM AND HE HATED THEM ALL −

They didn't trust him. They hated him. They acted like they hated Konoha, but really, they hated _him_ more than they hated Konoha. They would rather turn him over to their sworn enemies, than allow him to have what he wanted.

He _hated_ them. _Hate hate hate HATED_ them all. He'd feed the next human to enter the room to Mother. Leaf or Sand, they all deserved to die. Every human being, no matter who they were or where they came from, was exactly the same when crushed to a bloody pulp. If only he could just _– move –_ he'd get out of here; he'd kill them all – if only Mother would respond –

HE WANTED TO SEE THEIR BLOOD

SEA SPILLING OUT _RED_

 _LIKE HIS MOTHER HIS UNCLE HIS FATHER HIS VILLAGE LIQUID IRON BREATHE_

But no matter how much he begged for Mother, Mother wouldn't come. Mother, the only one he could trust, and they'd taken Mother away from him. He couldn't trust these people. Mother, Mother was all he could trust, and they −

"If you're going to behave so rudely, Gaara, no one will want to talk to you."

"SHUT UP!" he roared at the sealed glass, not even paying attention to who he was talking to. He bashed his fists against it, but nothing happened. If only he had his sand…but they'd taken that away from him. Even his clothes, where he normally hid his extra sand, had been replaced with something that didn't have pockets.

He felt so weak.

Never before had he felt so weak.

Even when he had still been a stupid little child – stupid enough to trust his idiot, idiot uncle! – he'd always been powerful.

 _No chakra. No sand. No Mother. Nothing._

"Suit yourself. But, remember, if you do want someone to talk to, all you have to do is ask. _Politely_." Saying so, the man turned around and left.

And then was nothing around him but silence.

 _Too quiet_.

Gaara threw himself against the transparent wall and screamed.

But no one came.

* * *

 _Observation Room 12_

"You really think you can do it?" Ibiki asked, glancing at the monitor.

"Give him some time. It's only the first few days. He's understandably confused and upset," Inoichi explained. "Just ignore him if he's being violent, and reward him with bigger rooms and special privileges if he cooperates. Make it clear that you're not going to kill him, and that he can go free once he stops trying to kill _us_. He's a smart boy; he'll figure out being polite will get him better results. You already know how to do this."

Well, of course. The most effective interrogation technique, Ibiki found (apart from bribery, but that was more for civilians) was to build up his terrifying reputation before a captive, and then allowing someone more attractive to pick up the pieces. _Look, I'm on your side. I'm only doing my job, like you. Please, I don't like seeing you get hurt. You have to tell me what you know, otherwise Ibiki will come back. If they think I'm getting through to you, they'll leave you to me, and we'll all have an easier time._

"The old carrot and stick policy, hmmm?"

"Just be glad there is a carrot in the first place. We're supposed to be his friends. The point of this is to show how different we are from Suna."

 _Even though we aren't,_ Ibiki thought, looking at the video feed. Gaara had stopped banging on the glass a while ago, and had since curled up at the foot of the wall, unblinkingly glaring at the empty hallway. "He might just be like this forever."

"Maybe. Maybe not. But I do know that despite acting aloof, some part of him still internally craves acknowledgment. Otherwise he wouldn't have gone out of his way to prove his existence using the deaths of other people. If he was truly apathetic he wouldn't be so over-the-top kill-happy."

* * *

 _Amegakure_

"Well, look who the cat dragged in," Kisame grinned. "I didn't know you were so good with children, Hidan."

"Shut up," Hidan grunted. "I was going to kill them, but then they were interested in the Great Jashin, so I was going to interview them first. But then it started raining, because it's _always_ fucking raining in this fucking fuckhole – "

"Language, Hidan," Itachi sighed.

" – because fuck you, Uchiha, don't tell me what to do, and also because I hate the rain and atheists like you – hey, that rhymed! Anyway, so I was going to take them to a cave or something, to see if they were true converts. But then this party pooper over here – " he jerked a thumb at Kakuzu, "said that something like this should go to The Great Lord Pein-what's-his-face first. Personally, I think he was just being a greedy miser like he always is."

Sure enough, Kakuzu had headed straight toward his account books as soon as the two of them had passed through the door, and was feverishly flipping through the pages of the Bingo Book and tallying up something. "Shut up, Hidan."

" _You_ shut up, heathen!" Hidan yelled in reply. He turned back to the newcomers. "Anyway. While we wait for Mister Loopy-Eyes to get here…where were we? Creepy twins? No, talked to you already. Flute girl? Nah, not your turn yet. Spider-man? Nah, don't give a damn about you. Fat boy? Fuck you, too. Ah, yes. You, bone man, what's your excuse?..."

* * *

BONUS #19

 _An extra scene from this chapter (Ch. 24) has been posted on the forum._

 _[wwwdot] fanfiction [dotnet] /forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/_

* * *

 **A/N: The brainwashing of Gaara.**

 **It really depends on whatever side you take. For some, it's better for Gaara as they treated him horribly in Suna anyway. Others would argue against it, because it's wrong to steal a kid away from his home, not to mention the whole brainwashing scheme on principle.**

 **I for one am condoning neither side. Just because I made it happen doesn't mean I agree with it. This was more of a little experiment for me: is it possible to "rehabilitate" Gaara** _ **without**_ **a magical friendship speech from Naruto?**

 **But food for thought: whose side are you taking?**


	25. The Sound and the Fury

BONUS #20

 _Posted on forum: [http] [www] fanfiction [dotnet] /forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/_

* * *

 _Konoha Central Hospital_

Konoha hadn't changed much from when she had last seen it, Tsunade decided.

It had grown, true. There were far more buildings now, and far more people. The telephone poles hadn't been there in the time of the Shodaime, and at least five different restaurants crowded that one corner that had initially been solely Akimichi land. And the children seemed older. That might have been because there wasn't a war going on right now, so they weren't sending all sorts of underaged soldiers out to the front lines. So the children didn't have to grow up so quickly. They didn't die so quickly, either. There was once a time when everyone was given the rank of Chunin once their age hit the double digits regardless of whether or not they were actually ready. Now, two years older, most were lucky to graduate from the Academy on their first try.

But underneath all that Tsunade still felt the tremors of her old village. Growing up among not one, not two, but three Hokage tended to do that to you. Her grandfather, her great-uncle, and her teacher. All of them kindly old men with gentle smiles. All of them able to destroy hundreds, even thousands of lives, with a single order. The weather was deceptively sunny. She knew that for the prisoners underground, it was not.

Even now, she still didn't know how many of those orders had been unwilling or not.

"Tsunade-sama – I am honored – I mean it is an honor – I mean – please to meet with you – I – "

First-year hospital interns. Oh, how cute.

But Tsunade gave the kid her best smile. _You're supposed to be on your best behavior, now. No more drinking and gambling and all that fun stuff._ "Now, there's no need for such formality. We are all healers here, yes? Every lifesaver is equal."

"Thank you, Tsunade-sama!"

 _("Was that – was that Tsunade?")_

 _("Yes! And she actually talked to me!")_

 _("Oh my gosh! You_ have _to introduce me, quick!")_

She didn't even know the kid's name.

"Well, Tsunade?"

She turned back to her old teacher. "Well what?"

"Is it satisfactory?" the Hokage asked her, gesturing around the hospital.

And it really was. The facilities were shining clean and perfectly organized – not a speck of blood anywhere, thank goodness – and she could tell that the staff were much more well-trained than fifty years ago, when every able body was forced to fight and not heal. She remembered, once upon a time, when the Medical Corps weren't so well-established yet, and bodies upon injured bodies were simply crammed into unsanitary tents, waiting for aid that would never come to them. Overworked and underpaid doctors, with too many patients and too little time. The waiting room was almost empty here, even though the volume of people walking in and out were about the same.

Tsunade wondered what it would look like when war descended upon them again.

"Goodbye, onee-san! Thanks for the band-aid!"

"Be good to your mother, okay?" one of the nurses came out. "And promise to be more careful when training with shuriken next time!"

"I promise!"

 _They make band-aids with cartoon characters on them now?_

"Onee-san! Can I have a band-aid with Princess Yuhiko on it, too?"

"Now, darling, band-aids are only for if you get hurt!"

"Don't hurt yourself on purpose just for a band-aid, though. How about a lollipop instead?"

 _Lollipops? They hand out lollipops, too?_

"It's…" she frowned, trying to find the right words.

"It's…what?" the Sandaime asked.

Tsunade didn't know what to do. On one hand, she was starting to regain that sense of purpose she'd been missing ever since she had left the village; on the other hand, there was a Chunin in room 203 that was bleeding all over the place from a bad slash by a bandit with a sword.

Instinct told her to run and hide and not take Shizune along this time, so she couldn't give their location away. Unlikely, since she sadly relied on Shizune to take care of her hangovers a _lot_. And so all that remained was loyalty.

"I'll live," she said finally.

"Good." Sarutobi-sensei smiled at her. "Welcome home, Tsunade."

* * *

 _The Hokage's Office_

They had arrived home to relatively little fanfare, on his end, at least. Konoha Central Hospital had gone into uproar the moment Tsunade set foot through the sliding doors, which meant that there was little attention left for _him_ , the amazing person who had brought her home in the first place.

Well, at least it had been easier to slip away to go report to the Hokage. Fighting off crowds of shapely, adoring fans was hard work. Talking to the Sandaime? even more so. Jiraiya shifted under his old teacher's scrutinizing gaze.

"Tsunade informed me that Kakashi's treatment was only partially successful."

"Mostly unsuccessful, but better than I could ever hope of," Jiraiya agreed.

The Sandaime frowned. "We need him."

"Yes, I know."

"Can't let that talent go to waste. Not to mention he'd go stir-crazy if we forced him into retirement. I can't deal with his shit, not now."

"Of course."

There was a short silence as the Sandaime mulled over his tobacco.

"Unfortunately, I'll be keeping you very busy for the next few weeks, Jiraiya. Possibly months. Anko Mitarashi recently came to me with a very interesting proposition regarding Orochimaru, and as sad as I am to say this…I was forced to comply with her demands, because they were simply too reasonable to refuse. You'll find the full specifications of this project waiting for you with ANBU Research."

"Great," Jiraiya snarked. "Anything else you need, sensei?"

"No; that's it for now. Unless you want to check up on Naruto as well. He's starting on mastering the Nine-Tails. Kakashi and I have paired him up with Yamato."

Well, that was new. Jiraiya did a double-take. "What? Really? This soon?"

"We can't afford to leave him untrained, Jiraiya," the Hokage said darkly. "People are already out for his blood regardless. There is only so much we can do to mitigate that danger. There will be a day when he will have to save himself, and I fully intend for him to at least be ready when that time comes."

* * *

 _Training Ground 3_

Giving up was something that I normally didn't do.

 _Leave it be._

But every time I closed my eyes, I could hear Anko hissing in my ears.

She wasn't a bad person, and I knew it. Despite her unnerving personality, I still respected her. But no matter what I did, I just couldn't get rid of her _voice_. Whatever she had done to make sure of that, it had been a very clever job.

Or maybe it was just me.

Maybe it was for the best. Maybe she was right. Maybe I really did need to leave some things be.

I didn't want to.

But I had to.

There was no doubt, I was still a little shaken from that visit. Maybe it really was me. All I had to do was be careful. That was just my fault. I was going stir-crazy from being bored. You should know the type of person I am by now. Never a moment's rest. If there's no trouble I'll go looking for some, and if there isn't any around I'll make my own.

I barely said anything to Ino and Naruto when they arrived at the training ground. Perhaps it was for the best; they seemed more content to talk about how their training for the final tournament was progressing, and I was more than happy to simply listen.

"Well, don't you look chipper today."

We jumped in place and turned around slowly. Damn, I _hated_ it when Kakashi-sensei snuck up on me like that. "You're early."

"For the second time since we've last seen each other, too!" he grinned. "Wow, you guys are all such lazy slowpokes. I've been here waiting for you guys for nearly a quarter of an hour."

Ino threw her hands up in the air and flopped down onto the ground. "The world is _ending_!"

"Anyway…You three! You're late!" Kakashi-sensei barked.

"No, we're not!" Naruto yelled back. "You said meet at 9:00 a.m. It's 8:55 right now!"

"Really? My watch says it's ten."

"You don't even _wear_ a watch!"

"I do _too_ wear a watch. I hide it underneath my socks."

"Sensei, you're wearing _sandals_ ," Ino pointed out. "Either you're a big fat liar, or you're the special type of abomination who wears socks with sandals."

"I resent that. For your information, my fashion sense is flawless, thank you very much."

I wasn't Ino, but even I had to disagree, and voiced my opinion as such, starting with his hair as an example.

He glared at me. "I have had this haircut since I was born, and let me tell you, I would get fired for telling you children how successful I am with the ladies..."

"Because of, or in _spite_ of everything?" I snorted. Kakashi-sensei didn't answer. "That's what I thought. So. What did you do to get Tsunade to return to the village?"

He tilted his head to the side. "Was it that obvious?"

I crossed my arms. "You leaving with Jiraiya, everyone with vague connections to the hospital in total uproar, Naruto screaming and yelling about some 'baa-chan' that was supposedly super strong – " here Naruto let out a tiny whimper of protest about how he wasn't _that_ loud (he actually was) – "yeah, I'd say it was."

He shrugged. "Gambling addicts do love having their habits enabled."

"You actually _bribed_ her to come back? Out of all the things that persuaded Tsunade of the Sannin to return to the village, it was _money_?" Naruto asked incredulously.

"Did you expect more from one of the Sannin?" Kakashi-sensei asked.

Naruto scratched his head. "Well…not really…I mean, it's not the money itself. The Sand guys tried to attack us over money, so that didn't surprise me. But she didn't leave because of money, did she? So why would she come back because of it?"

It was a good point, to which Kakashi-sensei simply replied, "We _might_ have also used a bit of guilt-tripping and threatened usage of force if she didn't comply."

Naruto scratched his head. "Oh."

"Well, enough of that. Since we've been apart for so long, I thought we'd run through a few training exercises as a team again."

And he brought out the bells.

At our stunned collective silence, Kakashi asked, "What?"

"Again? _Really?_ "

"Of course!" he replied, catching Naruto in the forehead after a failed tackle. Naruto flailed against Kakashi-sensei's grip, but as his arms were too short, he was stuck windmilling in the air like a brain-damaged swimmer. "I didn't even say 'go' yet."

"Ninja," Naruto shot back. Kakashi-sensei let go. Naruto fell flat on his face.

"As long as I make the rules I can just say it didn't count," Kakashi said, smirking.

"By that logic, you can make up all sorts of rules to say that it didn't count, even when we _do_ get the bells for real," Ino whined.

"Ninja."

We glared at him.

"Come on, guys. I can barely do even the most basic jutsu. This should be a piece of cake for the three of you."

"Fine," Naruto huffed, and formed the hand seals for his shadow clones. "We can totally – "

He never managed to finish his sentence, however, because the moment the field was filled up with his clones, the entire ground collapsed underneath his weight in a giant cloud of gravel and dirt. Where there was once solid earth, now there was nothing left but a massive sinkhole, as if someone had just spent a quarter of an hour doing nothing but digging around underground like a giant mole, shifting all the soil into large and unstable air pockets in the process.

That was, in fact, exactly what had happened.

Kakashi-sensei surveyed the damage and winced. "Is this a bad time to mention that I was practicing the Headhunter jutsu earlier?"

"YES," Naruto yelled from beneath the rubble.

"Oh. Um." He looked around wildly, and then suddenly pointed behind us at nothing in particular. "Look! A distraction!"

None of us fell for it in the remotest sense, but that didn't stop him. Before we could physically apprehend him (or the bells) he had vanished in a swirl of leaves.

 _"Hasta la bye bye and don't forget to clean up the mess!"_

And so we were left to stand there in stunned silence as we took in the level of damage he had done to Training Ground Three.

"You guys," Ino said, looking around, "I think he might actually be trying to sabotage our chances at a promotion."

Naruto walked calmly into the middle of the rubble and collapsed face-down in the dirt. "Now that's just silly."

* * *

 _Amegakure_

"Whoa! So Jashin-sama can make you immortal?"

Hidan gave a toothy smile. "Yep!"

"Can Jashin-sama bring people back to life, though?"

Hidan clicked his teeth. "Not heathens! So that means your precious master is out of the running, unfortunately. But if _you_ join, and sacrifice yourself to the great Jashin-sama, he'll − "

The girl in the group crossed her arms and attempted to push past the group of people to the door. "Well, thanks for nothing, jackass. If you're not even going to try to help Orochimaru-sama then this was all a massive waste of time!"

"Tayuya! That was impolite."

"Fuck impolite, you snob, she insulted Jashin-sama!" Hidan roared, grabbing his scythe.

This was the scene that assaulted Pein's eyes when he walked into the room. Beside him, Konan looked on, as impassive as ever.

"Hidan, what are you doing?" Pein interrupted. "Who are these people, and why are they here?"

"Oh! Heeyyy…Pein-sama…" Hidan grinned impertinently. "I thought they were converts, but it turns out they were just heathens like all the others."

"Let me see them," Pein sighed.

The children brought before him were nothing special on their own. They were of decent strength and skill. Perhaps, with proper training, they would be ready to work with the Akatsuki in a few years' time −

− But then the Rinnegan saw the markings on their bodies…and Pein knew…

…They were not his. They would never be his. Because they already belonged to someone else.

Someone who was a traitor to their cause.

" _Orochimaru_ ," he spat underneath his breath.

The thin one with the white hair stepped forward. "We thank you for your hospitality. I am Kimimaro, and these are the Sound Four. You knew Orochimaru-sama?"

"Orochimaru- _sama_ ," Pein spat in disgust. "Is that why you followed Hidan back here? You wish for _us_ to help you revive your master?"

The fools in front of him nodded.

Pein truly pitied them. Such talent, such _promise_ , and all for what? Wasted, _wasted_ , upon worshipping a cowardly, traitorous snake. He would help them, had it been possible, but he had seen Orochimaru's mode of work. Once he successfully sunk his fangs into something, it was impossible to escape.

The Akatsuki were not very close with one another, not with cruel and selfish men like Hidan and Kakuzu within their midst, but it was a general rule that defection was not an option. He particularly hated traitors. The concept of lying about a promise made had been especially traumatizing to him in the past – in more ways than one.

 _Yahiko…_

Orochimaru was a traitor. Orochimaru deserved to die. And now that he was dead, one of his slaves was asking for assistance in bringing him back to life.

"Unfortunately for you," Pein whispered, "Orochimaru is no longer our friend. We shall not do as you ask. However, now that you are here, we _are_ interested in your services to us," he added on, because he was merciful, and wished to give them an opportunity to prove themselves. Perhaps there was hope for them yet. Perhaps it was still possible for them to let go of their past loyalties to Orochimaru.

But it was not meant to be. "I cannot do that," Kimimaro responded. "If you are not a friend of Lord Orochimaru then I cannot work for you. I apologize for bothering you, and shall find another person to perform my request. Good day."

Those words, as polite as they were, angered Pein more than any swears. Such audacity! Walking before him, demanding his services, and thinking he'd allow them to leave without paying the price. Seeing their cocky, complacent faces made him want to teach them the true meaning of pain.

So he did.

"I am afraid I cannot let you leave," Pein told him coldly. He signaled the other members, and the one exit to the room was blockaded by a wall of bodies. "Now that you know where we are, you are a security danger to us."

The crew of five frowned.

"Execute them," Pein ordered.

To call it a slaughter would have been an understatement. The children were powerful for their age, but they were no match for the Akatsuki.

A shriek ripped through the air, and Pein did not have to turn his head to know that Samehada had found its first victim. There was a sickening splatter and a snap of bone. And then another. And another. And another.

"Look, kid, it's nothing personal. I'm _trying_ to make it quick, all right? If you stop fighting back, I can promise you it'll hurt less," Kisame said placatingly.

"Go…to…hell…" Defiant to the last, that one was.

Kisame shrugged. "Your fault for having an excessive number of arms." The sword came down in a wide arc, and when it came up again it was coated in blood and large, leathery strips of skin. It was almost like watching a spider get stuck to your roll of newspaper after you slapped it, except instead of a spider it was a human, and instead of crushed exoskeleton it was glassy eyes and punctured lungs and fragments of ribcage pointing in the air like the toothy open maw of a shark. Pein could see his exposed organs, the rise and fall of his diaphragm clearly, in time to his pulsing heart, as he made his last gasps.

Regrettable, that they would never experience true pain. Not really. True pain was not being blinded by poisoned needles, or feeling steel pierce flesh. True pain came from _feeling_ , and these children were former minions of Orochimaru. They did not know the feeling of loss. Not like he had. They had been taught to be cruel and uncaring to each other. They had been taught to sacrifice their emotions. Just like their master.

Would they know pain, if he killed one twin and not the other?

He would never know now, Pein thought clinically. Kakuzu had already gotten to them. Both of them. More pulp for the Shinigami.

The pungent stench of blood filled his nose, like so many dead bodies, dripping from the air and smothering them all like a thick wool blanket on a burning summer day. On the other end of the room, Itachi held up the limp corpse of the lone girl in the group. Her little metal flute lay in three pieces on the floor, and her head lolled around loosely on her shoulders, courtesy of a snapped neck.

That was Itachi. Neat and precise to the fullest. He was always cleaner compared to the others. Pein sniffed at the growing mess on the floor, and was glad that Itachi's chosen method of dispatch resulted in less to clean up.

A blur of white flashed in the corner of his vision. Pein raised his hand, bored.

"Shinra tensei."

The piece of bone flew away from him with a high-pitched whistle. It collided with the opposite wall with a loud snap, and bounded back to embed itself in the back of his attacker's kidney. The young man was sent sprawling to the floor, and Pein thought that might be the end of him. To Pein's pleasant surprise, however, he did not remain kneeling.

 _A valiant and noble fighter,_ Pein thought. _Yahiko would have liked him._

"Perhaps we should eliminate him quickly," Itachi suggested. "If the seal on his chest is allowed to grow unchecked, he may pose a bit more trouble than he is worth."

"I will not allow you to impede Orochimaru-sama's – "

Hidan swung his scythe, cutting him off. Steel met bone in a bright wave of sparks, and the twin curves of the red blades and jutting ribs interlocked with each other like the alternating teeth of a Venus flytrap.

"FUCKING BASTARD – " Hidan snarled, trying to pull his weapon free.

"Please do not use those words. My name is Kimimaro, and it would be polite to refer to me as such," the boy sighed, drawing an improvised bone-sword from his arm.

"I'll call you what I damn well please," Hidan grunted. "Little bitch."

"Shut the hell up, Hidan."

"Don't tell me what to do, Kakuzu!"

"Hidan, behave!" Pein snapped, already extremely bored of the entire situation. It was not enough that they had to come here unannounced and make a mess of his property, but also waste his time. Hidan, missing his chance to witness any further bloodshed, grumbled and sulked in the corner. Pein ignored him and turned back to their target. "As for _you_ – "

"I understand now that you do not like Orochimaru-sama, and that coming here was a mistake. I apologize for offending you," their captive stated. "But I will not apologize for serving Lord Orochimaru. I respect him because he saved me. All my life I have been worth nothing, and he took me above my past self. There is more to him than you realize. Men are more complex than sheer good or evil, and while he has hurt you he has also helped many others, like me. Please listen to me. He – "

" – was a traitor and a brute, and I do not wish to hear you sing any more praises of him," Pein finished, though Kimimaro would never hear his words, for Kisame had also chosen to end the speech at the same time, in that charming Mist fashion of his.

Drowning on land. Water was a useful element, indeed.

In his life, Pein had learned that while all men came in different shapes and sizes and strengths, their innards were all equally weak.

Mortals ate. Mortals bled. Mortals died.

Kimimaro, at the end of the day, was just another speck of dust among grains of sand. He was fast, and he was strong – even more so when he attempted to use his curse seal to transform. But apart from his special technique with his bones, he knew no other skills. He was neither particularly intelligent nor well-versed enough in elemental transformations to figure out a way to escape. And though he tried to attack back, it hadn't been enough. Kimimaro could not control his own position, nor could he see where any of his attackers were.

Regeneration did not help combat a lack of oxygen.

Had Kimimaro known how to perform an air jutsu, he might have bought himself enough time to escape. Had Kimimaro known how to perform an earth jutsu, he might have stopped the water attack altogether. Had he even thought of something as simple as Kawarimi, he could have just run off. They would have chased after him and caught him quickly, of course – the combined strength of the Akatsuki was more than enough to take him down – but the point was that he might have lived just a little bit longer.

Of course, the fact that he was also under the influence of Itachi Uchiha's genjutsu as well might have had something to do with his lack of reaction.

There had been no struggle. Just a glassy reflection of red and black commas – and then – blessed _silence._

Pein was not Orochimaru. He was nothing like Orochimaru. He was a merciful god, who worked for the good of the world and not himself. He did not cause suffering because he enjoyed it. He had given these children a noble death in battle.

Had they remained with Orochimaru, they would have only been used until their worth had run dry. Once that happened, they would have been killed, or abandoned and left to die. And the betrayal of their supposedly "great" master would have hurt them even more. That was how he worked – Orochimaru only ever thought about himself. The rest of the world, to him, was expendable. Hanzo the Salamander was another one of them.

Pein despised people like that. Selfish manipulators who only pretended to care about others. He mildly disliked Hidan and Kakuzu, but at least neither of them acted as if they were anything other than themselves.

"Sasori, have you any need for the corpses?"

Sasori shook his head. "Maybe the bones one, though I doubt his regeneration powers would hold up well in a puppet. The others, definitely no."

"What about you, Kakuzu? Do you see any use for them?"

"Just the heads," he sighed, reaching for a knife. "Though, they weren't that well-known in the first place. All the Bingo Books I checked only offered a pittance for their deaths."

"Very well."

With Kakuzu's work done, the cadavers burst into flame.

Pein watched the cremation with a mild, amused sense of detachment. It was so sadly simple, Pein decided, to rob a human of his life. He did not like to, but it was what he had to do. Funny, how easy it was to die, compared to how hard it was to live. If only the rest of the world would be so willing to see it in the same way as he did. If only everyone was as willing to sacrifice themselves for his perfect ideal as he was. It would certainly make his task at hand much easier.

The crackling of the flames slowly died down to darkness, until finally all that remained of Orochimaru's little minions were tiny fluttering feathers of ash.

Nothing remained of them except silence.

* * *

 **A/N: To be fair, when I said that the Sound Four would have their own storyline, I never specified how long it was.**


	26. Drowning in Air

BONUS #21

 _Posted on forum: [http] [www] fanfiction [dotnet] /forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/_

 _Quick note: Bonus #20 is also up there as well, for those of you who didn't see it last week. Apologies for the troll's fake update._

* * *

 _Amegakure_

"Now," Pein said, turning to the rest of the Akatsuki, "does anyone have something actually _worthwhile_ to tell me?"

There was a muted pause throughout the whole room before Sasori finally spoke up.

"Sunagakure no Sato is no longer in possession of the Ichibi," Sasori said. "Their reparation fees for the failed invasion of Konoha included transfer of their only jinchuuriki. The Kazekage's youngest son is now a hostage, hidden away in some unknown location."

"Wait, so Konoha has Suna's jinchuuriki now? What?" Hidan asked.

Sasori nodded.

Hidan rolled back his heels and whistled. " _Wow._ Your village is made of a bunch of spineless wimps, if they had to give up their tailed beast to that lot of peace-loving tree-huggers. No wonder you left."

"Speak for yourself. Weren't you born in a tourist town?" Sasori replied icily.

"Let's try to stay on topic," Itachi said quickly. "Remind me, where are the jinchuuriki all distributed again?"

"I know when the First Hokage was around, he gave the One-Tail and Eight-Tails to Sand…" Kakuzu began. "Then Two and Seven went to Cloud, Three and Six went to Mist, and Four and Five went to Rock. Meaning, they kept the Nine-Tails for themselves."

"Yes, that was implied when the Nine-Tails exploded in Konoha, idiot," Hidan snarked.

"Shut up," Kakuzu muttered. "As far as I know, Cloud lost the Seven-Tails to Waterfall when I was still there, but then they stole the Eight-Tails from Suna not long after. The Six-Tails' jinchuuriki went rogue; the positions of Four and Five are sketchy – they are still affiliated with Rock, but only very loosely."

"Cloud will be the hardest to get," Kisame mused. "Their jinchuuriki are both respectably treated and well trained. They are also both grown adults and have mastered their beasts. The others do not have the same connection with their villages. Regardless, the Leaf is the easiest target; loyal or not, they still haven't mastered their power. Whoever their two jinchuuriki are, they will be young and untrained, and one of them is a prisoner of war, not an actual citizen."

Itachi grunted tonelessly. "That would be a fair assumption – "

"Enough," Pein interrupted, and the room fell silent. "This meeting is adjourned. All of you, get out of here and return to your duties. I have some thinking to do."

The room cleared in a matter of seconds, save for two people. One of them was Konan. And the other, well, Pein had no intention of conversing with unless absolutely necessary. That was their cordial relationship. Pein did not answer unless spoken to.

Because all the power in the world didn't change the fact that Tobi was an annoying little shit.

Luckily, Tobi didn't seem at all inclined to mess with him today, and for once Pein was able to plan with ease. By the time the sun rose the next morning, he had a new set of orders ready.

* * *

 _The Polished Kunai_

The second of the two favorite hangouts of the Konoha Jonin circle, this bar was located on the other side of the _Rusty Kunai_ , and was ironically run by the same old war veteran – although, interestingly enough, he no longer seemed disabled when distributing drinks to that side of the room. Now, why they sometimes went to the _Rusty Kunai_ and why they sometimes went to the _Polished Kunai_ , Asuma had no idea. Though the _Polished Kunai_ was much more tastefully decorated and well-kept than the _Rusty Kunai_ , both of them took their alcohol from the same basement. He supposed that the regulars who arrived first simply picked one side of the same bar by random, and all of the people who arrived later simply congregated around the side that already had their friends in it.

"Kakashi," he greeted his old friend warmly. "Good to see you back."

"You're looking a little worse for wear," Kurenai observed.

"I've had better days," Kakashi admitted.

"So what happened? We haven't heard anything about you other than that you were really badly hurt. No one else could tell us anything, either." At this, Genma shot Asuma a sour look. "And the people who _could_ , _wouldn't_."

"Look, I promised the old man I wouldn't, all right?" Asuma said.

"We did hear something about the Toad Sage and the Slug Princess coming back to town, though," Aoba interjected sneakily. "As well as the third person of their team dying. You didn't have anything to do with that, did you? Did you, Hatake? Did you?"

"What? Who? Where?" Kakashi sat up straight, looking around wildly.

Asuma groaned. "Look, just ignore him. And scratch all that business with my old man's old students. What the hell happened to _you_?"

"Eh," Kakashi answered lazily, immediately discarding his earlier tension and relaxing back into a pose of exaggerated nonchalance, "the fallout from a bunch of the stupid shit I normally do finally caught up to me."

"Really?" Genma asked. "What happened?"

"Things."

"What sort of things?"

"Stuff."

"What sort of stuff?"

"…Things."

"Kakashi," Kurenai whined, holding her head. "Please. It's too early for this."

"It's like six in the evening," Kakashi said innocently.

"Any time is too early for Kakashi time," Asuma groaned, tipping back a glass of extra-strong sake, hoping that by the time Kakashi _really_ started whipping out the Mindfuck no Jutsu he'd be drunk enough to escape the worst effects.

"Come on, Kakashi, tell us," Raidou said.

"Look, it's just really stupid stuff that I really don't want to talk about," Kakashi sighed.

"That's fine," Asuma said quickly.

"But – "

"No buts, Genma. If the man doesn't want to talk, then just let him be. There's plenty of other subjects of conversation that don't center around why the hell Hatake upped and disappeared for basically a month. We can talk about something else. Capiche?"

Kakashi shot him a grateful look. _Thanks, Asuma._

 _No problem. I owe you that much, at the very least._

"Sure," Genma sighed dejectedly.

"How about we do something else," Asuma suggested. "Like complain about our Genin teams."

"Oooh, I like that," Kakashi sat up straight like an attentive schoolchild, a twinkle in his eye.

"Sakura's still wearing her red _silk_ dress," Kurenai whined, jumping on the train immediately. "A _red silk dress_. I did so much work on her – I even managed to make her start taking her training seriously by telling her 'Sasuke will only love you if you make him acknowledge you first' – but she _won't. Stop. Wearing. That. Dress!_ Kakashi, what's your secret? How'd you get Ino to stop?"

"Oh," Kakashi said absentmindedly. "I just kept shoving her under the bus until she caved in and gave up."

"I know, but _really_ , what did you do?" Kurenai pressed. "I want specifics!"

"I just told you," Kakashi said innocently. "I shoved her under the bus. And in front of carts. And into mud puddles…and scummy lakes…and piles of manure…"

"You _ruined_ her clothes just to make her stop wearing them?" Kurenai asked.

"Hey – _I_ didn't do anything," Kakashi protested, holding up both his hands. "They were all mere accidents. Training-related things, you understand. Her fault for not wearing appropriate attire."

Kurenai scratched her head as she mulled over this information.

"The Chunin Exam finals are tomorrow," Genma reminded them. "Bets are still open. All of your kids have really good stats. Do you guys want to bet on them?"

"A thousand ryo that both Naruto and Ino win their first fight, but none of them get promoted to Chunin," Kakashi answered automatically.

"Um…" Asuma glanced at Kakashi. "Are you sure it's okay for us to bet on our own teams?"

Kurenai shrugged. "Shino, I think, has a good chance against Ino. He's a smart boy. And I've trained Sakura to the best of my ability against the Byakugan. But Neji Hyuga is a very talented and intelligent young man…it's a tossup."

"Doesn't seem fair to the genjutsu users, does it?" Asuma asked. "At least you've got two kids in the finals, though. I only have Sasuke – but I think he has a good chance of making it through."

Kurenai put her chin in her hand. "Sheesh. I still can't believe all three of Gai's kids managed to make it. I do believe that at least one of my kids will make it past the first round, though. Eh, what the hell. A thousand ryo that Kakashi will win some money."

"You're not going to bet on your own kids?" Genma asked.

"I have faith in my Genin. But I also like money," Kurenai explained.

"How does that even work?" Genma asked.

Kurenai shrugged. "If Naruto and Ino win, he'll make money. If Naruto and Ino lose, he'll scam someone out of their money anyway."

"So…" Asuma said, trying to diffuse the awkward silence. "What did _you_ do with them today, Kakashi? You weren't around to train them for the whole month, right? I remember seeing Ino and Shikamaru training with their parents…and then you had some other guy train Naruto…"

Kakashi shrugged. "I just gave them the bell test today."

"…Aren't you supposed to give them the tests on the first day or so?" Asuma asked.

"Well, I gave it to them again."

"Why?"

"Because."

"Because why?"

"Because because."

"Because because why?"

"Because because be– " A glare from Kurenai silenced him. "…Because I felt like it."

Asuma ran a hand through his hair. "What happened?"

Kakashi raised an eyebrow at him. "What makes you think something happened?"

"Because something _always_ happens whenever you're around, Hatake," Asuma groaned.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Kakashi said, stealing a sip from the glass of a group of younger Jonin sitting a few people down from them. Not two seconds later, the victim of his alcohol theft had noticed the missing volume, and proceeded to loudly accuse his friend of drinking from the wrong glass.

"Kakashi, what happened…" Kurenai sighed.

"Why does everyone keep asking me that same question?" Kakashi protested.

"You know why," Asuma said.

"You know what I think?" Kakashi asked. "I think that you two are ganging up on me."

"What makes you say that?" Asuma asked.

"It's all part of your little conspiracy," Kakashi explained dramatically, complete with narrowed eyes and shifty hand movements. "You thought I wouldn't notice, but I'm on to you two. See, you guys keep asking me these questions, one after another, because you actually don't want me here. You're trying to annoy me into leaving, so that you two can finally have some _alone time_ to converse with each other. Because when _I'm_ here, you guys _have_ to talk to me, as a mutual friend – but when I'm gone, that obstacle disappears, and – "

"Oh for love of the Rikudo; she is _not_ my girlfriend!" Asuma said hotly.

"Look, can we talk about something else?" Kurenai added.

"See, you guys are agreeing with each other again!" Kakashi pointed out triumphantly. "Right, Genma? They're ganging up on me!" Genma was too busy laughing to dispute that claim. "See, he sees it too."

"I believe we were talking about the kids," Asuma groused.

"Oh, and there's _kids_ involved now – Asuma, I didn't realize – "

Asuma threw up his hands. "You know what I meant! Our _students_!"

"Students? Me? Really?" Kakashi took a sip of his drink, and the mask went back in place before any of them could see anything. "Huh. I've been wondering why there were short people following me around for the better part of the year."

Kurenai wrinkled her nose. "Don't try to pull that on me, Kakashi. I see you and those kids messing around in Training Ground Three every morning!"

"What's Training Ground Three, again?"

"The place that you commandeered specifically for use as a meeting headquarters for Team 7 members only, even though all non-fenced-off training grounds of Konoha are supposed to be open to the public," Kurenai reminded him.

"Oh. Right. That." Kakashi took another sip of his drink, once again, too fast to see under the mask. "…There's no more Training Ground Three."

"…What are you talking about?"

"I _said_ , there's no more Training Ground Three." Kakashi lifted a shot glass up to his lips, and then suddenly slammed it back down on the counter in realization. "Holy _shit_ , you guys! There's no more Training Ground Three!"

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, slow down, man!" Asuma said quickly, grabbing Kakashi by the elbow before he could bolt. "No more Training Ground Three? _No more_ Training Ground Three? What do you _mean_ , there's 'no more Training Ground Three'? That place is literally an _empty grass field_! How can there _be_ no more _Training Ground Three_?"

"Yeah, about that," Kakashi said sheepishly, "apparently, the Headhunter jutsu doesn't refill the spaces you leave behind after you return aboveground…"

They all stared at him.

"It's okay, though!" Kakashi added quickly. "I'm making them clean it up, so, it's all cool, you know! Nothing to worry about!"

Still a stunned silence.

"Only _you_ , Kakashi," Asuma sat there, nursing his drink. "Only _you_ would be able to destroy an _empty field_."

"That wasn't me; that was my _Genin_!" Kakashi protested. "Everything was completely fine until Naruto stepped on it!"

"Same difference," Kurenai argued.

"Look, Genma! They're agreeing with each other again – "

"For the _last time_ , Hatake, she is _not_ my _girlfriend_!"

"I didn't _say_ she was your girlfriend. I just mentioned that you two happen to agree a lot. Why?" Kakashi grinned. "You seem pretty vehement on denying that she's your girlfriend. Maybe you're in denial. That's not healthy, Asuma-san. It really isn't."

"Oh, for the love of heaven, _shut up_ – "

"MY BELOVED AND ESTEEMED RIVAL! WE MEET AGAIN! I HAVE HEARD THAT YOUR GENIN TEAM SUCEEDED IN DESTROYING AN ENTIRE TRAINING FIELD IN LESS THAN TEN SECONDS! SO I SHALL HAVE MY TEAM DESTROY _TEN_ TRAINING FIELDS IN LESS THAN _ONE_ SECOND! AND IF THEY CANNOT THEN I SHALL DO ONE THOUSAND ONE-FINGER PUSH-UPS, AND IF I CANNOT DO ONE THOUSAND ONE-FINGER PUSH-UPS THEN I SHALL RUN ONE THOUSAND LAPS AROUND KONOHA ON MY BUTT, AND IF I CANNOT RUN ONE THOUSAND LAPS AROUND KONOHA ON MY BUTT THEN I SHALL DO ONE THOUSAND PHOTO SESSIONS WITH THE SEASHELL BIKINI SWIMSUIT COMPANY – "

Kakashi disappeared in a swirl of leaves.

Kurenai retched onto the floor.

And Asuma contemplated taking his own kunai to the forehead.

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

Once again, I was back at the campfire, stuck between the flickering flames and a rabbit.

But I was tired. I was so, so tired. And to think I was complaining of not having enough to do just a short while ago.

Well, now we were back to normal, kind of. Except for the rabbits. I was growing to hate the sight of the damn things.

Maybe if I focused on this tonight, I could really follow Anko's advice. Because logically, it _was_ good advice. I _wanted_ to listen to her, so badly. It was like that past week of me not being able to train, and going around snooping instead, had opened up this new compulsive little part of me that hadn't been there before. Or perhaps it had always been there, and it was only strong enough to show its face now.

That was the nice thing about training. It kept me busy; it helped me forget about the other stuff.

 _Those who walk the shadows…_

"Are you all right, Shikamaru?" my father asked. "We can't continue if you're not feeling well."

"No. I can do this," I insisted. "I already took too much time off. I need to pull myself back together."

"Don't pretend you were sitting around all day like the medics told you," my father said, a teasing lilt to his voice. "I saw you staying up way past your bedtime all those nights with a big pile of books."

"Don't tell mom," I cut in quickly, and he laughed.

"Since when have I ever?" Then, he sobered up. "In all seriousness, Shikamaru, don't overwork yourself. I reserve the right to halt our training sessions if I think you need it." He sat down on the log, and pulled out another rabbit. "Ideally, you'd master this as soon as possible and then never use it again. But the way this generation attracts trouble…"

"Orochimaru. Sand. Cloud. _Konoha_ ," I said, the words coming out like a familiar prayer. "Anything else?"

"There is always something worse out there, Shikamaru."

"If only I knew what they were."

He closed his eyes and put his head on his knees. "I know you hate me for not telling you anything, Shikamaru, but some things are just too _dangerous_ for you to know right now. At least right now, you have plausible deniability, should anything happen. What sort of father would I be, if I took that away from you?"

Something about that sounded extremely familiar, but I had no idea what, and it was driving me absolutely nuts.

"Tell you what, Shikamaru," my father sighed. "When you master this technique – not just learn it, _master_ it, and show me that you can properly _control_ it without supervision – I'll tell you everything you need to know."

"Fine."

"Information that must otherwise _remain confidential_ ," he added.

"Of course."

 _Information I plan to find out anyway,_ I thought, but I didn't tell him that.

God, I hated this technique. It was an undignified conglomeration of contradictions. I couldn't practice it extensively, not in the same way I hammered at ninjutsu until I got them down, because I couldn't work when my father didn't allow me to. And yet I still had to master it, because of my father's added incentive, and also because not being able to do so personally offended me.

Tonight was supposed to be warm, and yet all I could feel when I stared at the rabbit was fear.

It was illogical. I knew it was illogical. It was a _rabbit_ , for the love of – whatever. Sure, wild animals could be aggressive, and a rabbit could do plenty of damage if it felt threatened, but this one was several meters away from me and stuck in a snare besides. I could easily kill it with a kunai before anything happened.

No. I wasn't afraid of the rabbit. (But I was.) (But I wasn't.) I wasn't afraid of the rabbit killing me, like I might be of a hungry tiger. It was just…every time I practiced this technique, I had the feeling that there was something else… _there_ …

Anko was right; I had to check myself. My success with Izumo and Konohamaru was going to my head. _Baby steps. It's not enough to be clever; you have to be wise. And wise people don't overload themselves._

Oh, but it was just so difficult to _leave things be_ …

I thought I had more self-control than this. I really did.

 _Kakashi-sensei. Ino. Naruto. You're really going to leave them alone? You're really going to just let something like this go? You can't. What's more important? Keeping them safe, or hiding in a box inside your own mind because you're too afraid to take action? You've already started turning the wheels, and there's no stopping it now. No, more than that – you've been on the wheel the entire time, and only now you've realized it was turning. And now that you know the wheels are turning, how can you un-learn that? Hm?_

I was like my mother. Always a compulsive need to act. The thing was, I couldn't for my life understand why any of what I was doing could be _bad_. I mean, of course driving myself crazy was never the point of that, but it was absolutely preposterous, to compare me to Orochimaru. I could make a list right now, of what _not_ to do. No kidnapping orphans. No experimenting on humans. No torture or sadism. Easy.

This was just to make sure Orochimaru wouldn't come after my friends again. As soon as I knew for certain that he was caught and gone, I would rest easy, and put this all behind me, and relax like a normal person. Unless, of course, another problem sprang up. Then I'd just take care of that one when the time came.

"If only we could all just…" he trailed off, looking up. He sounded extremely defeated and sad.

"Let me guess: everyone in the world should just stop all _this_ and take up cloud watching just like you, right?" I smiled.

"Exactly. Like that. Or stargazing, if you prefer," my father said, gesturing at the sky. "The stars move even more slowly than clouds. I like that." He turned to me. Well, enough of that. "Are you ready?"

I nodded. "As ready as I'll ever be."

He nodded. "Then let's get started."

I readied my shadow. The chakra slid from my fingertips to my feet. It ran down my back in an icy trail, bleeding along the dark earth, as slick as oil and as thick as blood.

 _Unlike the other Kagemane techniques, there is no true time limit, since it does not require a continuous stream of chakra to maintain. To be honest, it's not truly a chakra construct, either. It requires chakra to "start" the process, but once it's going it's only a matter of your own strength of will, within your own mind – and that has nothing to do with chakra at all,_ my father had told me, the first night we had tried it. _And unlike the Yamanaka jutsu, it doesn't leave the user defenseless. But there are some very serious side effects that you must always be aware of._

The rabbit twitched.

 _When you split the consciousness, Shikamaru, you also split your sanity. This is why you cannot use this technique as freely as the Yamanaka do with their own. Because their technique requires a continuous stream of chakra, they are always connected with their own body even when in someone else's. This form of possession, on the other hand, provides no such safeguard._

It curled up on itself.

 _Why is it necessary to split the consciousness, then?_ I had asked. _Wouldn't a whole mind work better for a complete mental takeover?_

It tried to run home, but could not.

 _In order for a complete mental takeover to take place, there can be no continuous stream of chakra from the remote user. Your mind must be independent of you, and wholly attached to its new host. If there is no continuous stream of chakra, what else can your mind use to find its way back home?_

It was white.

 _Its other half. Its missing piece. The only semblance of itself it still has._

I closed my eyes and focused on my shadow. The last several attempts had ended in failure, which my father had expected. I could pinch my shadow down to an almost invisible thread, but when it came to the separation, I was at a complete loss. I would always end up blacking out and waking up in my own bed in the morning, completely exhausted. It was just impossible, my logical mind supplied, to separate the shadow of one object into two pieces without cleaving the object itself in two. And I was not really keen on cutting myself apart.

I thought back to the time when my father was teaching me the Shadow Clutch and the Shadow Threads, and how I had the same trouble trying to figure out how to get the shadows off the ground at first. It was all about the chakra, and the mental will. Except that this technique, if done right, according to my father, should barely use any chakra at all. Just a little bit, for the final snip, to separate the pieces, and then the rest was up to you. A literal split of the human consciousness, embodied in a structure created by the absence of light.

I heard myself breathe.

 _In._

 _Out._

 _In._

 _Out._

 _In. Out. In. Out. In._

I heard the rabbit's heartbeat.

 _Thump._

 _Thump._

 _Thump. Thump. Thump._

 _Thumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthumpthump –_

Wait. There. Right there. A flicker of light in the middle of the shadow, a crack in the fabric of darkness…wait −

 _Almost there…_

And then the sea of oily bloody ink spilled back down upon me, from the treetops all the way down to the earth, one massive absence of light.

 _You cannot run. You cannot hide. Not from me, for I am a shadow._

 _One half plus one half equals one whole,_ says the rabbit (what?).

I blacked out.

* * *

 **A/N: If you could punch anyone, real or fictional, in the face without suffering any consequences, who would it be?**


	27. New Arrivals

BONUS #22

True/False contest posted on the forum.

* * *

 _The Chunin Exam Finals_

 _The Pit_

"You should just give up," Neji said. "You're nothing but a silly girl from a no-name family. You cannot possibly hope to defeat me."

"Keep talking; I dare you," Sakura replied, crossing her arms behind her back.

"Those who are weak are destined to be weak. My eyes can see through any genjutsu you are planning to use. Give up. You can't win."

"Say that after you've beaten me," she hissed.

"Foolish little girl," he sighed. "Show me how pathetic you are."

Sakura held her breath, put together her fingers, and _moved_.

* * *

 _The Stands_

Kurenai was praying as hard as she could, to every god she had never believed in before. Neji had been ruthless in his treatment of Kiba; it seemed he wasn't going to make an exception for Sakura, either. But Sakura was a smart girl, and together, they had spent the entire month coming up with a plan specifically for going up against a Hyuga.

Step one was to get out of range and stay out of range. Sakura's taijutsu wasn't the best and Kurenai admittedly was in a less than stellar position to teach her, being not very physically inclined herself. If Neji managed to get within striking distance it would be all over. The only way Sakura had any chance of beating him was to get out of the way and act at a distance. Which was easier than it sounded; there were plenty of things lying around the arena that could be used for a quick substitution.

More concerning was the fact that the Byakugan was a visual jutsu that could not be fooled. Therefore, it served to reason that any attacks against it should focus on a different sense, like –

"Auditory genjutsu," Kiba realized, covering his ears. By his side, Akamaru was whining softly. Kurenai produced a pair of earmuffs for the two. No one else in the audience would be affected, thankfully, as Sakura's chakra control was good enough to keep the focus of the technique on Neji. It was only bad luck that Kiba's hearing was just that good.

This particular genjutsu caused no hallucinations; it simply focused on balance and physical paralysis. Being able to see what was wrong wouldn't help him in this case. Nor would breaking the genjutsu completely fix the situation; auditory effects could last long after the technique itself had been stopped, as Neji found out the hard way when neither a _Kai_ command nor self-injury returned his sense of balance to him.

"Smart idea," Asuma grinned, watching Neji drop to the ground drunkenly. To his side, Shikamaru smiled in approval. With both his teammates and all three members of Team Gai competing, he was left sitting with his old friend Choji. The only member of the Rookie Nine not either in the competitors' box or with them was Hinata, who was sitting with the rest of the Hyuga clan. "It doesn't matter if he knows where she is or what genjutsu she's using if he can't reach her."

Of course, if Neji had given up that quickly, that would have been a bit boring. Sakura threw a few weapons, but he wasn't so weakened enough yet that he couldn't deflect them, so she was back where she started. He struggled back to his feet and formed a Gentle Fist stance. Kurenai raised an eyebrow. Sakura was on the other side of the arena, and here he was, unable to take more than two steps without falling over.

What was he planning?

 _"Secret Technique: Great Heavenly Rotation!"_

"What the heck _is_ that?" Kiba asked.

"Obviously," Shikamaru sighed, "it involves greatness, the heavens, and rotation."

Choji coughed.

Down in the pit, Neji had transformed himself into a wild spinning force field of pure chakra. Sakura, who so far had been holding up her genjutsu quite well, was blown into the opposite wall from the sheer power generated by his rotation. There was a nasty sounding _thump_ as she hit the concrete, and Kurenai held her breath. For a second, she feared that Sakura had been knocked unconscious – but then the girl managed to struggle to her feet, bracing herself against the wall.

 _Good positioning. The wall will allow her extra support against his technique._ However, the Great Heavenly Rotation had been a risky move for both. Sakura, on one hand, could no longer move so freely around the arena. But she was still at an advantage – for Neji had tried to counter a technique that had already been messing up his sense of balance (as most auditory genjutsu did) by spinning around extremely quickly. The feeling would have been akin to doing triple-axle jumps while seasick. It was a wonder that he was still standing; the boy must have had a cerebellum of steel to have not keeled over of dizziness yet.

 _What will you do now, Sakura?_

Neji was now kneeling on the ground in the center of the arena, head on his knees. He might have survived her first genjutsu, but he definitely wouldn't survive her second one.

So Neji zipped forward, intending on ending the fight quickly.

Sakura was fast.

Neji was faster.

His fingertips connected with Sakura's stomach – one, two –

And then garishly painful flashes of light flooded the arena, and he doubled backwards in shock, his eyes scrunched shut in pain.

Neji was definitely more skilled than Sakura when it came to physical combat. He could have won; he should have won; he _would_ have won –

But there was a tiny problem.

When the match had first started, he had been standing there, talking, for about thirty seconds after they had been cleared to start fighting.

Thirty seconds. Thirty whole seconds for Sakura to turn the battlefield in her favor.

Charging a light bomb genjutsu only took ten.

The ringing began again, louder this time, and Neji fell over, retching.

Sakura hadn't escaped the fight unscathed – Neji had managed to get up to eight palms or so before he had fallen over – but winners were decided by the last person standing. It was quite unfortunate, really, that the Sixty-Four Palms took sixty-four moves to complete, and blinding flares only took one.

* * *

 _The Box_

"Shino vs. Ino is next. Hey, that's actually pretty funny," Naruto snickered dazedly. "Shino versus Ino. It rhymes. Geddit, Ino? It rhymes."

"Ah, shut up, Naruto," Ino muttered, punching his arm. "Unlike you, some of us _didn't_ have clones to divide up all that work with."

"Yeah, well, my clones did most of the work anyway, so _your argument is invalid_ ," Naruto retorted, rubbing his shoulder. "See, I made like fifty clones, and they each – "

"Can we not?" Ino groaned. "My brain _hurts_." And considering that she was about to go out there and fight Shino Aburame, that was _not_ good. It wasn't just the fact that she had a thing against "creepy-crawly bugs and other stuff" – the kikaichu in and of themselves were dangerous opponents, even without someone as sneaky as Shino to control them with. She'd need all the smarts she had, if she was going to hide from that swarm.

She wished Shikamaru was here. She could get some last-minute advice from him. But there was nothing she could do; only participants were allowed in the competitors' box.

"Shino Aburame and Ino Yamanaka, please report to the pit!" the announcer yelled.

"Good luck, Ino!" Naruto called. "But studs like us don't need luck, right?"

"Sure," Ino whispered, looking like she was going to throw up.

"Just think about it this way!" Naruto grinned. "If you win, the bugs won't get you. If you lose, the bugs will. That's all there is to it."

She glared at him. "Gee, thanks. That makes me feel _so_ much better."

"No problem!"

"Ino, calm down," Naruto told her calmly. "They're just insects."

"Look who's talking," Ino snapped. "Remember that one time with the snails?"

Naruto groaned. "Oh, come on! That was _one_ time!"

In three seconds, the match would start.

Two.

One.

* * *

 _The Stands_

Shino did not make the same mistake as Neji. As soon as the proctor dropped his hands, his insects immediately started swarming. Kurenai crossed her fingers. She smiled proudly at Sakura, even though she probably couldn't see her from the box. _Would it be too much to ask for two for two? Ino Yamanaka, I know, is a clever one. But Shino should be able to outsmart her, right?_

Ino immediately threw a smoke bomb, It wasn't just any smoke bomb, however – judging from the nasty smell, she had deliberately filled this one with the strongest bugspray she could find.

But the insects kept coming anyway. Kurenai smiled to herself. _This is your time to shine, Shino!_

"I expected you to try something like that," Shino explained. "But we in the Aburame clan breed all of our insects to be chemical-resistant."

Ino, however, showed no signs of worry – which was good. It would be a little boring for the spectators if a Konoha shinobi lost so embarrassingly quickly, even if her opponent was another Konoha shinobi. Not that Kurenai was the type of person who liked to draw out a fight just for her own amusement, but longer battles were usually more interesting to watch, and things that were interesting to watch were good for business. Potential civilian customers didn't always understand the ideal shinobi battle – that is, a two-millisecond hit-and-run – preferring something that went a little more toward the "cool" factor.

A single spark was all it took – and the entire cloud was ablaze. When the smoke cleared, a great number of the kikaichu lay upon the ground, incinerated.

 _Never trust canned aerosols._ Kurenai nodded. As expected. _Now what will you do, Shino?_

"I had my bugs spy on you during your training," he explained. "You seem to be very proficient in fire jutsu, which my insects are not fully resistant to, so I trained them in maneuvers to protect each other from the worst burns. Maneuvers that also allow them to hide from view _and_ move into the proper position against the enemy at the same time. Take a look."

And suddenly, thousands – no, _hundreds_ of thousands – of kikaichu beetles burst out of the ground in a great hive beneath Ino's feet.

Ino shrieked and keeled over, unconscious, while Shino stood there and watched calmly.

"Well, that was kind of lame," Kiba sniffed. "Shino's bugs didn't even start eating her and she's already fainted."

"No – that can't be right," Kurenai muttered. "If she's unconscious, why hasn't the proctor called the match?"

"He must be waiting for something," Asuma said, staring at Genma.

"She might be squeamish, but she's a forceful girl. She wouldn't give up so easily. What's she up to?" Kurenai continued to reason out to herself.

Shino paused to take a moment to push up his glasses with his finger – only to be trapped midway. "Ah. I see. So the explosion was just a diversion. You were really aiming for me, and not my bugs. An intelligent strategy, to end the match."

Indeed, now that Kurenai looked more closely, there were little flares of sunlight scattered all around the arena, glinting off the reflective surfaces of the many coils of ninja wire that Ino had wrapped Shino up with. His arms were effectively pinned to his sides; even though his opponent was out of commission, she had still managed to paralyze him temporarily.

"But I don't get it," she whispered. "Was that the only part of Ino's plan? Did she really lose that easily?"

Shino was still talking. "Unfortunately for you, Ino, I do not require movement to control my bugs. We, the Aburame, can communicate telepathically with our own hives."

 _Tele…pathically?_

Kurenai turned back to Shino, who was still frozen in place. Suddenly, the bugs retreated from Ino, and she gasped.

Of course. How could she be so stupid? Shino's opponent was a _Yamanaka_! Kurenai jumped to her feet, and, at the same time, from the competitors' box, she could hear Sakura come to the same conclusion, if her yelling was any indication −

"SHINO! NO! MOVE OUT OF THE WAY, SHE'S USING HER – "

But it was too late.

"I FORFEIT!" Shino yelled, uncharacteristically loudly, and immediately after that, Ino regained consciousness and started to spastically twitch and hop around in place, complaining about "taking two showers after this" or something of that nature.

"Winner, Ino Yamanaka," said Genma, concluding the match.

"Wait – I'm confused!" Kiba scratched his head. "Was she just pretending to faint? What did she do to him? Why did Shino forfeit? He _had_ her!"

"That was the trouble," Choji said, munching on his chips. "She had _him_ , too."

"Huh?" Kiba asked.

"The Mind-Transfer Jutsu," Shikamaru told him. "The Yamanaka technique."

Kiba's mouth dropped open. " _Oh…_ wow. Damn."

"What she did was really weird, actually. The Mind Transfer Jutsu isn't normally supposed to be used in combat, since it's super slow and takes a lot of time to return to the original user's body if it misses. You're only supposed to use it against a restrained opponent – usually a Nara's Shadow Bind." Choji ripped open a new bag and continued eating. "She didn't have that, so she got him in that wire trap instead. When she fainted, we thought it was because of the bugs, but she was really just using her technique."

"The kikaichu take at least a few minutes to suck someone's chakra dry, even a small Genin, and Ino knew that," Shikamaru explained. "Meanwhile, the Mind Transfer Jutsu is slow, but not _that_ slow. It takes maybe a few seconds to take effect. Shino's problem was thinking that Ino had actually fainted, and thinking that he had won already. He was a pretty smart fighter, but he neglected to account for her using her non-combat techniques. He might have been more prepared to struggle, then."

"The trap she made was a good trap, though. He wouldn't have escaped it in time, anyway," Choji shrugged. "Unless he could order his beetles to chew through the wire in only a few seconds somehow."

"There were still many ways this could have gone wrong, though," Shikamaru pointed out. "He could have somehow used Kawarimi and escaped, or replaced himself with a bug clone – anything. Ino had been counting on the fact that the bugspray explosion would force him to stand still and take cover while she made the rest of the traps. She had been planning to use the Mind Transfer Jutsu from the very beginning. Risky, but it worked."

 _Oh, well,_ Kurenai thought. _You can't have everything in life. It was an impressive fight, anyway. They were really going back and forth, not just in jutsu, but in planning, too! I'm just not sure the rest of the audience got what was going on._

* * *

Contrasting with _Shino Aburame vs. Ino Yamanaka,_ the fight – more of a brawl, really – between Sasuke Uchiha and Rock Lee was right up the spectators' alley. As soon as Genma had dropped his hand, it had basically devolved into one enormous pissing match between two alpha males – one of them the Last Uchiha, and the other a taijutsu monster.

Ninjutsu, genjutsu, _and_ taijutsu, whereas Lee could only use the last skill – Sasuke definitely had the upper hand in this one, but that didn't mean it was going to be any easier than his fight with Sakura Haruno. Being able to use techniques didn't mean anything if they didn't connect, and Lee had only gotten faster since the preliminaries. Sasuke was receiving as much damage as he dealt.

Both fighters were at an impasse now. Sasuke had a wider range of skills, but Lee's speed caused Sasuke's attacks to miss more often than not. If this became a matter of endurance, then Gai's student would definitely win. Sasuke needed to start making any tactical decisions now if he wanted to have any hope at winning.

And then it started – when Lee missed a punch, and hit the wall.

"Sasuke's going to win," Shikamaru declared.

"How do you know?" Kiba asked, squinting.

"He's finally using his Sharingan _properly_ ," Shikamaru explained. "Lee is much faster than him, so it'll be hard to predict where Lee will be at any given moment – but Sasuke can predict where Lee _will_ be, and that's what makes all the difference. More specifically, Lee has to get close to Sasuke to land a hit – so all Sasuke has to do is cast a minor genjutsu at that exact moment to distort Lee's perception so that he misses. Even though Lee is most likely better trained in dispelling genjutsu after his loss to Ino, he still can't stop to break out of an illusion while in the middle of a punch. Few people can."

"And in the middle of an offensive attack is when Lee is the most vulnerable defensively," Choji realized, stuffing a handful of crisps into his mouth. There was another loud crack, as Lee's fists – now bloody – collided with the wall again. Sasuke ducked downwards, and managed to catch Lee in the stomach with the heel of his sandal.

"Dirty move," Kiba commented.

There was a great explosion of noise from the crowd, and they all looked down in the pit again just in time to see Sasuke finally slam an exhausted Lee into the ground with a fire jutsu.

"There's no such thing as a dirty move when you're a shinobi," Shikamaru shrugged. "Lee is a very strong fighter, but he has _got_ to get smarter about people taking advantage of his weakness if he doesn't want to die."

* * *

 _The Pit_

Tenten gripped her shuriken tightly. She would have to be careful with Naruto. Having sparred with his team before, she knew that he had wind ninjutsu and shadow clones at his disposal – a big problem for a weapons user like her. Her projectile use would be highly limited today; there was no use in trying to be precise against someone who could blow all of her weapons in the wrong direction while constantly replicated himself. Every one of her attacks would have to be wide-range, effective against a large number of opponents, so that even _if_ they missed, she'd at least be able to take out several clones at once.

Well, Maito Gai was her sensei, and never let it be known that one of his students couldn't fight in close quarters.

As soon as the exam proctor dropped his arm, she let loose as many explosion tags as she could. Naruto immediately dove to the ground and covered himself with a sideways disk of swirling wind, which protected him quite well from the flying debris and heat. When the smoke had cleared, Naruto was gone, and five clones were in his place.

Tenten narrowed her eyes. This was going to be harder than she thought. Luckily, she always came prepared with an excessive amount of weapons, and today was no different.

Spiked maces were always one of her favorites.

Two clones appeared behind her, and Tenten immediately popped them both with a nice hard stab to the gut. Three more clones surrounded her from the front, and she managed to disperse them with slightly more difficulty. Dropping back to the ground, Tenten looked around. The real Naruto had disappeared, and more clones had taken his place. She swung her weapon, and the wall of blonde collapsed in smoke.

 _Where is he?_

Even if she had a Byakugan, however, she wouldn't be able to tell; all the clones were identical in both appearance and chakra distribution. It looked like she'd have to do this the long way, then – brute force her way through every single Naruto until she found the one that _didn't_ disappear at a single touch.

* * *

 _The Stands_

Kiba shook his head. "He's just spamming clones! That's not even a _strategy_!"

"If it works, it is," Shikamaru shrugged.

"That's dumb. _I_ could do that," Kiba grumbled. Naruto's tactics from earlier had not changed, except to increase the number of clones – all of which dispersed upon a single good hit from Tenten. Many more exploded in smoke when Tenten detonated another exploding tag. "He did this to Choji, too. If I could make clones, I could totally take him!"

"Well, Tenten seems to be holding up really well regardless," Kurenai shrugged.

"It's still pretty unfair," Kiba muttered. "The real Naruto _has_ to be in there somewhere! When is he going to run out of chakra?"

"It'll probably be a while," Kurenai said. Naruto was still pumping out his clones, and he hadn't even broken a sweat.

Suddenly, there was a great roar from the crowd as Tenten managed to apprehend one of the various Narutos in the arena. This one, however, did not disperse upon contact.

Which only meant one thing – she had finally caught up to the real one.

Tenten wasted no time wailing into him.

It was at this moment that Naruto realized that he was in some deep trouble, and soon after that, he had taken to his heels and started running, Tenten hot in pursuit, the jeers of the crowd following the two of them all this time –

And then suddenly, the ground collapsed in a massive explosion underneath Tenten's feet, and Naruto, just a few feet ahead of her, was the only one who had made it out of the blast range in time. Tenten, totally unprepared for an attack from underground, was out cold in a matter of seconds, blown against the back wall of the pit.

Asuma groaned.

"Wait – how'd he do that?" Kiba asked, scratching his head. "He's not an earth type, is he?"

"He didn't need to," Asuma said. "There were already the ones from the third fight that Shino's bugs had dug when they were hiding from Ino's fireball. He knew he wouldn't be able to get her from the air, since she has all those weapons on her, so he decided to get her from below instead. While Tenten was distracted by the clones aboveground, some more clones belowground must have been enlarging and connecting the underground caverns left by Shino's bugs. From there it was a simple matter of filling them with exploding tags…"

Shikamaru continued, "…and then, when Tenten caught him – or if he let Tenten catch him – he simply ran away, knowing that she would chase him because she was already so frustrated with all the clones he had been annoying her with earlier – "

" – right to where he wanted him," Kurenai finished. "A normal exploding tag can be dodged if seen quickly enough, but if there were tons of them crammed into empty pockets beneath the ground…you can't exactly jump away from a patch of earth that's collapsing in upon itself. Least of all at the center, the lowest point. Tenten was standing right above the spot where the tunnel was deepest when Naruto let the tags explode."

It was then that Asuma realized just how utterly _destroyed_ the pit looked after this. The whole ground was giant gaping pit, save for a few edges. He looked at Naruto, who was wincing sheepishly at the damage, and then at Shikamaru and Ino, who had both collapsed into hysterics at the state of the arena.

"So _that_ was what happened to Training Ground Three," Asuma realized.

* * *

 _Intermission – The Box_

"I'm totally going to destroy you, Sasuke-teme! Just you watch!"

Sasuke snorted. "Dobe. Like you could beat me." Having seen how Naruto just fought, however, Sasuke had to grudgingly admit that facing him might actually be a challenge. Now that he was taking the energy and – he hated to admit it, but ingenuity – he normally put into pranks and focusing it on training, he was quickly turning into someone Sasuke thought he might respect.

The thought of that was terrifying. Naruto Uzumaki, growing up? Please. It wasn't just a matter of principle…he wasn't going to be arrogant and declare that the dead-last was never going to get good at anything, ever…but…the thought that he and all his classmates were quickly leaving their childhoods behind was…sobering…

 _What the hell do you care. You haven't been a child since the day your family was all murdered in their beds._

"Hey! Say that again to my face, I dare you!"

"I'm _already_ talking to your ugly face, idiot; what more do you want?" Sasuke snapped back, the insults coming out like instinct.

Over to the side, Ino and Sakura were both glowering at each other silently, each of them promising the other an extreme world of pain as soon as their match started. Their little war was no longer a matter of who got to marry him when they grew up, Sasuke realized – they were two shinobi competing against each other on matter of principle, just like he and Naruto were.

Well, anything to get the two harridans out of his hair. He turned back to Naruto.

"Dobe."

"Teme."

"Dobe."

"Teme."

"Dobe."

"Smoke."

"Do – wait, what did you say?"

"Smoke," said Naruto, sniffing the air. "I smell smoke."

He pointed at the treeline. Where the leaves were once green, they were now blanketed in a mass of dark clouds.

* * *

 _The Stands_

The crowd was murmuring, but I could barely hear them. It was all I could do to keep my vision from going black. It was as if I was back at my house yesterday, drowning in shadow. But instead of cold, wet, inky blackness, it was now hot, dry, and smoky, and I was suffocating under the weight of thick air.

* * *

 _Outside Konoha_

Itachi Uchiha stood atop the mountainside and stared down at his former home.

The world was on fire.

But that had been apparent long before his flames had touched the kindling.

* * *

 **A/N:** **For those of you who didn't think Sakura should have won: if it makes you feel better, Sakura isn't "stronger" than Neji; he just underestimated her.**

 **This entire thing was just a setup for teaching Neji a lesson in humility (and monologuing). Everyone likes Neji-the-Awesome-Ninja-that-Kishimoto-Effing-Killed-so-NaruHina-Could-Happen. No one likes Neji-the-Emo-Fate-Obsessed-Kid-from-Way-Back-When-Before-He-Was-Cool.**

 **In general, none of this Chunin Exam one-on-one business is an indication of power level; more specifically, there is no proper "power level" anywhere. There is no such thing as an automatic win. Though it's** _ **less likely**_ **that a skilled person will be taken down by someone "weaker", it can still happen for stupid reasons.**


	28. Fire and Blood

BONUS #23

 _A deleted scene from this chapter has been posted on the forum._

 _fanfiction [dotnet] /forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/_

* * *

 _Konoha_

Itachi Uchiha was a man of few sensibilities, but the ones he had made up for the rest he lacked. For example, he was not candidate-of-the-year for environmentalism, but he loved peace, and if burning down several trees meant fulfilling his duties, he'd do it.

Likewise, he didn't have many rules on his personal code of honor, what with being raised as a shinobi and all, but sometimes he liked to think he was still a good person for fun. Knowing all the death and ruin that had occurred at his hands made that an impossibility, but everyone needed a good joke now and then.

Was it selfish of him, for subjecting his brother to a life of pain in the hopes that he'd be the one to deliver him a pure death in combat?

 _Sandaime-sama, I hope you got the memo._

"Is it just me, or are there more ANBU around than usual today? And shit, they're _really_ fast," Kisame swore, several meters ahead of him. "They must be really, _really_ paranoid if they've got that type of response time."

 _Sandaime-sama, I guess you got the memo._

"They are still on high alert after the failed attack by Orochimaru. And today is the final of the Chunin Exams. They mean to impress the dignitaries with their best troops on display," Itachi explained calmly. "I am concealing us with my best genjutsu, and we have made it this far, have we not? I don't see why you are worried."

Kisame stopped and stared at Itachi. "Really? _Really?_ "

"What?"

Kisame pointed to his face. "Itachi, what am I?"

Itachi rolled his eyes. They had done this before. Multiple times in fact. "…You are a fish."

"That's right. I'm a fish. Maybe my mother fucked a shark or something. The point is, I'm a fish, and do you know what fish do in fire?"

"…They fry."

"Exactly. So how about we hurry up and get going before I turn into a giant piece of sashimi – "

"That is grossly inaccurate. Sashimi is served raw," Itachi corrected, a small smile playing at his lips. "I thought you knew that, being from the Land of Water."

Kisame slapped his head. "Shut up, Uchiha." There was another roar as the fire around them spiked even higher. Over the walls of the village, he could see a conglomeration of white masks and green jackets forming up around the gates. "We have to get going. Now."

Itachi nodded in ageement. "Watch my back," he ordered Kisame, and together they stepped into the village to look for Naruto Uzumaki.

To find him would be a difficult task. Itachi knew they would not succeed. And if he had his way, they would never succeed.

Of course, Pein might be suspicious if he didn't leave at least one high-profile person dead or seriously maimed. Itachi sighed and drew his sword.

 _The things I do for love._

* * *

 _The Chunin Exam Stadium_

As soon as Kakashi had seen the ANBU flooding the area, he moved to gather up his team right away. This wasn't just some simple forest fire. Knowing Kakashi's luck, the Akatsuki were here, and they were after jinchuuriki. The high ANBU presence all but confirmed that. The Ichibi was safely tucked away one of ANBU's many underground mazes, which meant that the only one available to them – standing out in the open, along with every other Chunin exam competitor –

 _Naruto._

He jumped down into the box and grabbed the boy, ignoring his indignant yelps. Then he spotted Ino and Sasuke, and, understanding that they could become collateral damage, if the Akatsuki wanted bait, grabbed her too.

The village had already had multiple contingency plans involving jinchuuriki, even before Jiraiya returned with his disturbing reports of Akatsuki's movements. As Naruto's team leader, it was his duty to know every single one by heart.

"Jonin Hatake, you are supposed to be off-duty," said one of the ANBU. "Please – "

Kakashi gave the ANBU his most intimidating smile. "Shut up."

He didn't bother to wait for an answer. He had more pressing matters to deal with than the stammered apology of a rookie. In the few seconds he had taken to secure Naruto and Ino, the moving crowd had swallowed Shikamaru up completely. Now he had a choice to make – he could either ditch Naruto and Ino, and go looking for Shikamaru, or he could trust Asuma and Kurenai to take care of him.

"Kakashi," Yamato said softly, "take them if you like, but you have to stay with them, wherever you're going." He gripped Kakashi's shoulder hard enough that it was painful. _We can't have you out in the field._

"Tenzo – "

"My name is Yamato now." _No arguments. Keep your children safe._ "If you're so worried, I'll go find Shikamaru for you."

Kakashi could only nod. _Shikamaru's a smart kid. He'll be okay. In this specific situation, Naruto comes first. He's in greater danger._

The answer should have been obvious, and back in ANBU, Kakashi could make snap judgments like this all the time without feeling the least bit of hesitation. But for some reason, getting a Genin team had eaten away at his many years of cold hard logic, and all he could feel was a massive sense of – _somethingnotgood –_ for leading away two of his kids to safety while leaving behind the third.

* * *

 _ANBU Private Grounds AA9_

All of them had protested fiercely at being forced into hiding when they could have been out there, helping, but Kakashi-sensei would have none of it. Nor would he listen to the ANBU who were _supposed_ to take them to their designated safe house. Instead, he took multiple turns through what Naruto knew were supposed to be restricted grounds, from his many forays into the map rooms with Shikamaru and Ino, until they finally reached their destination – an empty field surrounded by a heavily guarded chain-linked fence.

Kakashi-sensei went up the gate, flanked by the few ANBU left that had managed to keep up with him, and whispered a few code words that Naruto couldn't make out. Before he knew it, all three of them had been introduced to a tiny cell, given about no time to compose themselves, and locked behind a slammed door.

It was at this point that Naruto realized, this was no standard safe house.

It was a prison.

Random ANBU #1 noticed this too, and protested, "Protocol says – "

"I know what protocol says; _I_ wrote it!" Kakashi-sensei snapped.

"What – "

"Protocol is wrong on purpose! Itachi Uchiha is a former ANBU; the established safe-houses are the _first_ place they'd look, you morons!" Gone was his normal, mild-mannered exterior. Here was someone who took no nonsense and refused to allow incompetence as an excuse.

He could only sit there and appreciate the horrible brilliance of his teacher's decision, to hide him here instead of – wherever he had originally been supposed to go.

The concept of a jail, that is, to keep someone inside, was so well-ingrained in people's minds that many tended to forget that they were also convenient for keeping people _out_ as well. Just like how Tazuna, the bridge builder from Wave, had been protected from Gato's men by Konoha's prisons, so, too would they be protected from the invaders here.

Unlike the pitch black, dripping dungeons of movies, this prison compound was very well designed. Lit around the clock with bright fluorescent lights, the place had an ultra-sanitized look, and it could have very easily been mistaken for a hospital had it not been for the steel-reinforced doors lining the hallways, and the weird color of paint. It was neither completely black nor completely white, but rather, an off-gray, greenish tinge.

Ino identified it as glow-in-the-dark paint. "It's the same stuff I paint stars on my bedroom ceiling with, except it's stronger. This must be a backup plan for light, in case someone tried cutting off the generators. I can't imagine having to sleep through this, though. It must be horrible."

On the bright side, the facilities were clean enough. Very new and well-maintained, actually. It was an dreary location, but not exactly the torture chambers he'd heard horror stories about.

 _Who are our neighbors?_ Naruto wondered. What had they done, to be assigned to such a well-built and better-guarded prison? Condemned to sleepless days and nights, totally isolated from the world, with little hope of their existence being remembered, let alone rescue or escape? He thought of prisoners of war, valuable enough to be used as future bargaining chips, but not valuable enough to be remembered until they were needed. Men who were intelligent enough that they could not be released, but not strong enough to warrant execution on the spot.

Did other villages have similar constructs? Were they better, or worse? How many other shinobi had Konoha also similarly abandoned to enemy villages? The Will of Fire supposedly never gave up a comrade, but there was always the chance that someone who was left for dead by an injured team without the strength or resources to take them back home was instead picked up by foreign scouts before they drew their last breath.

It must have been a horrible existence, to be imprisoned for life when your only crime was being abandoned by a village you fought for.

Naruto leaned back and closed his eyes, trying to think of something else, _anything_ else, that was a little less depressing.

"Sorry for the location," Kakashi-sensei's voice wafted through the tiny food slot, "but this is the best place they don't know exist yet." He swore softly. "I knew the Akatsuki were dangerous but I didn't think they'd be foolhardy enough to attack the village in broad daylight like this. The Sandaime said we'd have up to another year at least. Optimistic fool."

Naruto thought about the little whispers Konohamaru had been passing him all this time. He knew what they wanted from him. _This is my fault._

Ino put a hand on his shoulder. "This changes nothing. You could be a space alien robot for all I care. A team is a team is a team."

"How – ?"

"We didn't say anything because we didn't want to make you uncomfortable, but if you're in danger you don't have to hide anything around us," Ino said.

"You know?"

Sasuke snorted. Naruto glared at him. "What?"

"Of course she knows. Everyone with half a brain _knows_. It's the worst-kept secret in Konoha. Adults glaring at you like you murdered babies when all you did was paint a wall? Calling you a demon under their breath? Please." He crossed his arms, grinning. "Like _you_ could be some legendary beast. You're just a dumbass."

"If that's your idea of 'comforting' you need therapy fast," Naruto shot back. He didn't want to hear anymore. He didn't care. He had Kakashi-sensei and Ino and Shikamaru. And Iruka-sensei and Yamato-sensei. He didn't need any of them. If the others wanted to be mean then they could go ahead. Naruto had more than enough friends to counteract that.

"Behave," Kakashi-sensei warned. There was some yelling in the distance. "Stay here. Don't kill each other. I'll be right back." His footsteps faded down the hall.

Naruto leaned his head back against the wall. He was getting antsy. Trapped in a confined space, with nowhere to move…he could only imagine how terrible it must be for the Kyuubi, to feel like this all the time. All he could see in his mind was the sewer, and the cage where the fox lay.

 _"Hey, fox?"_

 _"The hell do you want?"_

The thing was as abrasive as ever. But at least it was responding in something other than threats. Naruto had convinced it to a minor truce – any conversation between the two of them would be carried out with reasonable responses. For Naruto, that meant he didn't have to listen to anymore of the fox's cruel words, and for the fox, that meant not having to talk to Naruto for any longer than necessary.

 _"I know you hate me, but if those guys come after us, you can't let them catch you, okay?"_

The fox grumbled. _"I hate you, but I guess I hate those bastards more."_

 _"So we have an agreement?"_

 _"Fine."_

 _"Good."_

And just like that Naruto was ejected from his own mindscape again, though with considerably less force than the last few times. If the fox was slowly descending into the territory of a halfhearted toss, then it probably meant he was making some progress.

Now for his other angry cellmate, curled up in the corner away from him and Ino. Naruto opened his mouth to speak, and then closed it. He hadn't talked to Sasuke in awhile, but depending on how things went he could prove to be more or less volatile than the Kyuubi. He was hedging his bets on the latter, seeing as he'd _seen_ the human side of Sasuke after the second phase of the exams, but better safe than sorry.

Conversation, Ino had taught him, went hand-in-hand with shogi. Just like Shikamaru planned out how to move his pieces, one must already know the direction one wanted to take a verbal exchange in before starting.

"You're not as much of a jerk as you used to be."

Sasuke snorted. "And you're not as much of an idiot as you used to be." But Naruto didn't react, so Sasuke was forced to turn to something else to pass the time with. He pulled out a kunai and began stabbing the ground aimlessly.

"Why are you here?" Naruto interrupted.

Sasuke stabbed the ground with a bit more force. "Because _that man_ is one of them."

"That man…?"

"The man who murdered my family," Sasuke clarified. _Clang._ "The man who ruined my life." _Clang._ "The man I'm going to kill." _Clang_.

"Really?" Naruto asked.

"I have to," Sasuke whispered. Steel met concrete. "I can't let this go on. I'm already too much of a liability. I have to get stronger!" _Clang_. "Back in the maze – when we were attacked by the snake – that was your sensei, wasn't it? Asuma-sensei told me I was only here because someone else took the hit." Sasuke asked. Naruto, seeing no reason to lie, nodded. "See, look at me. Jonin from teams that aren't even mine are getting hurt because of me. And now I'm in here, hiding, when I should be out there, helping…"

Naruto thought of Hinata and Choji. Two more people who knew to be decent human beings. "You care about them, don't you?" Sasuke's eyebrows knitted together. "Look, it's okay to admit it. I care about my teammates, too."

And then the jerk was back again. "Shut up, Naruto."

"You don't have to hide around me. I get it, okay? Being alone for so long, and finally having other people in your life you can trust…you don't want to see them get hurt."

"Shut up!"

Naruto kept going. "But if you want to protect them from people who might hurt them, you need to start with yourself!"

 _CLANG._

Sasuke slammed his entire blade flat into the wall, right by Naruto's face. "I swear on my dead family, Naruto. Shut your mouth, or I will shut it for you – !"

"I thought I told you not to kill each other."

They jumped. Naruto shot Sasuke a look.

"It was nothing, Kakashi-sensei! We were just messing around – "

"I can hear sharpened metal on concrete. That's not messing around," Kakashi-sensei said dangerously. "Put. The weapon. _Away_."

 _Fuck. He's not joking._

Sasuke must have felt the same murderous vibe, because he hastily shoved his kunai back into his pouch with terrified obedience. "I'm sorry. It won't happen again. Thank you for saving my life before, and for sparing it again."

There was a long silence. And then the murderous voice gave way to something else. "Please be safe. Including you, Sasuke. I mean it."

 _He's scared,_ Naruto realized. _And worried._

 _Why is that surprising? He's human, too._ Maybe that was what was expected of a Jonin sensei – always calm and self-assured. Or maybe Kakashi-sensei was always supposed to be one step ahead, and seemingly strange situations were in fact under his control. Or maybe that fear was always there, and it was Naruto who was getting better at reading the mask.

The rest of their confinement went by in total silence.

* * *

 _The Chunin Exam Stadium_

It was no secret that Asuma had never felt like his father's son, even after their reconciliation. Oh, he was a skilled Jonin in his own right, but he would never be Hiruzen Sarutobi. He had not been born with a blessed mind; no matter how hard he tried, he could never keep up. When surrounded by legends and prodigies, one could easily feel lost, everything just barely out of his short reach.

ANBU were shooting silent orders over his head left and right. Asuma could make out a few of them, but very poorly. _Nine…two…one-one…_ he was sure they were numbers, but he had no idea what the hell they meant. The point of those complicated codes was to make sure that no one but one of their own could understand them. His father, being the Hokage, had forced him to learn a few, but they rarely stuck.

There was a tug on his sleeve, and he looked down. "We have to go," Shikamaru Nara said. His eyes seemed oddly blank. "Konoha is being invaded." Before Asuma could even answer, he had already jumped his way to the top of the stadium walls, not even bothering with using the stairs, and Asuma had no choice but to follow him.

"How – "

Shikamaru pointed at the ANBU, flashing hand signs faster than a blink of an eye. Asuma sighed in exasperation. Leave it to Hatake to teach his kids black ops signals. He wanted to be jealous, that he hadn't been picked to teach the genius Nara, but really, what could the boy learn from him? Better to give him to a man who could actually challenge him. Asuma was doing well enough with two dojutsu and three noble clans; he could hardly complain.

All around them, civilians were following the exit procedures in an orderly, amused fashion, commenting on the splendid organization of the village and the impressive display of ANBU communication.

They thought it was just a forest fire. They honestly thought it was just a forest fire.

"I thought we took care of those traitorous Sand bastards," Asuma hissed, as he spotted a sign for _foreign village_. And another, _Sharingan._ It was the last one he saw before they exited the stadium, and then they were running for their lives through Konoha's alleys, though from what Asuma was still trying to figure out.

 _Sasuke…_

"Orochimaru's supposed to be dead, though," Kurenai said, and Asuma nearly missed the flash of I-know-something-you-don't on Shikamaru's face.

"It's not Sand," Shikamaru told him. "The hidden village in question was Rain."

"What does Rain have to do with this?" Kurenai snapped.

"Oh," Shikamaru muttered, and swore under his breath. He skidded to a stop, and Asuma followed suit. "Everything."

Asuma looked up and saw red clouds on black.

* * *

At first, Kisame had been confused as to why Itachi insisted that the two of them stand on disks of fire – especially after how vocal he had been about his aquatic lineage before. But then he remembered the Nara clan, and decided that he'd rather suffer dry feet later than get cut off in the middle of a fight.

Kisame smiled. "Hello, friendly people of Konoha. We are looking for a little boy with blonde hair and blue eyes; any idea where we might find him?"

He was _supposed_ to be in Safe House #9, according to the ANBU they interrogated, so either the Tsukuyomi wasn't as jumped up as Itachi made it out to be or someone didn't follow protocol. Now, how the heck were they supposed to predict the actions of an opponent when said opponent didn't even follow their _own_ rules?

 _Just like playing a lucky beginner at poker,_ Kakuzu would say if he were here. _Idiot doesn't know how or when he's supposed to fold, but none of that matters if he has the highest hand._

"Don't be silly, Kisame. They wouldn't know," Itachi replied. "The Kyuubi's Jonin minder lied about the rules on purpose. I _do_ miss his little mind games," he added, almost as an afterthought.

"Kakashi isn't here," the Jonin of the group said, drawing a set of strange blades. _Wind chakra. This is the Sandaime Hokage's son._ "We don't know where he is."

"We don't know, either," Itachi said. "But we know where he will be." He took a step towards the Nara boy.

They say before every fight there was always a still moment, an air of calm. That was a complete lie. They were shinobi, and shinobi were practical if anything. Kisame earned first blood before Itachi ever finished talking.

From there it was nothing but a whirlwind of death and organs. He couldn't help himself. This was all Kisame had been born to do, so he might as well do it properly. The world faded out, and then all he could hear was Samehada's call for meat, pulsing in his ears in time to his heartbeat.

* * *

 _What do we do?_ Kurenai panicked.

It had been Asuma's scream of pain that yanked Kurenai out of Itachi Uchiha's paralyzing genjutsu. She woke to Kisame Hoshigaki standing over him, sword raised above his shoulder, preparing for another swing, like a horrible nightmare, only real.

 _What everyone in the world does when they see an Uchiha,_ Kurenai reminded herself. _Go straight for the eyes._

This man was infamous for a reason. It was one thing to get stabbed or incapacitated, but to see flesh actually _ripped_ off like a thresher – it was horrifying.

The sword came down. Asuma rolled over, barely holding his guts in. The sword made contact. Another sickening crunch. She heard bones break. Blood bubbling. A low gurgle.

Kurenai could only describe her own scream as the most terrifying sound she'd ever heard herself make. She had always preferred painless, silent kills. She'd never thought she was capable of wishing so much _terror-anger-MURDER_ on someone – until now.

 _Have no fear._

She could only imagine thick vines wrapping themselves around Kisame Hoshigaki's neck and squeezing until his eyeballs burst from their sockets…tightening until the thorns punctured his jugular…she wanted to see his blue face turn purple, wanted to see sand and ash clog his orifices, wanted to see him burn and freeze simultaneously, wanted to see _his_ blood on the ground for once –

The feeling of glass shattering in her face brought her back to her senses.

Asuma. On the ground, broken, bleeding out. The Monster of the Hidden Mist was staring at her with an unreadable expression, his hand bleeding.

 _Who cut him?_

Nobody. He cut himself.

 _Why?_

The things she imagined earlier…

 _Nothing is imaginary to a genjutsu master._

But what was the point? What was the point of any of that? Asuma was dying, Itachi Uchiha was nowhere to be seen, and the boys –

She felt a glob of cold goo sink to the bottom of her stomach.

The boys were gone.

 _Kakashi is going to kill me._

Then she felt a million scaly spines pierce her stomach. The last thing Kurenai remembered was trying in vain to choke the life out of one of the world's most infamous criminals with her broken fingers.

* * *

"She is a ferocious woman, isn't she?" Itachi Uchiha asked me, glancing at Kurenai-sensei.

Barely a few seconds had passed. This was just like Orochimaru all over again. Only Itachi Uchiha was smarter, and even more dangerous.

I couldn't move. Itachi Uchiha stared at me curiously. The fires still burned beneath his feet. I did not have the luxury of using the same tactic as I had in the maze. I did have more advanced shadow jutsu to draw upon, but there was too much light around. Their effects would be negated. Nor was I stupid enough to engage Itachi in a ninjutsu battle.

"They call you a genius, too," Itachi purred, strolling in a circle around me. "A prodigy, perhaps with the capability to surpass even me." I could see Choji, also frozen under the effects of his genjutsu. "Well? Show me what you can do, Shikamaru Nara."

I did not let his false praise flatter me. Strategy was one thing, but combat with bloodline limits was another. _They're only here because they couldn't go after Naruto directly,_ I reminded myself. _Kakashi-sensei and Ino must also be safe._ Though the timing itself was a surprise, the Akatsuki were not. _So this is actually better than Orochimaru. We were prepared this time. They are all safe._

 _What about them?_ I thought, looking back at Itachi. _What the hell is he thinking?_ His choices made absolutely no sense. There were a million better ways to catch us off-guard than attacking in the middle of a large event, where security was already tighter than normal. Why not wait for the jinchuuriki to go out on a mission of some sort, when he _didn't_ have the protection of the entire damn village, and capture him there?

Instead, because of this botched operation, the entire world knew that they were here. And from now on, every mission Naruto went on would be doubly secure. They had just ruined their chances of an easy picking.

There was no way a supposed genius like Itachi wouldn't have realized something like this was going to happen –

"…I'm speaking out loud, aren't I?"

Itachi Uchiha tilted his head to the side. "Fascinating. Most people don't ever realize they are spilling themselves to me. They feel the paralysis; they believe that is the end of the technique. Not as effective as the Yamanaka, I'll admit, but more accurate and less expensive than getting a man drunk."

I rolled my eyes. "Are you quite done? Or would you like to sit here and explain why you've deliberately done things the hard way? Because I can't imagine someone of your reputation making a mistake as crass as this."

His voice took on a dangerous tone. "Careful, now. You've crossed into dangerous territory." He took a step forward. "Some truths aren't meant to be known. Now I can't let you leave."

There was only one thing to say to that.

"Shadow Possession complete."

Flames leave behind their own shadows, too. Very small ones. It had been that intimidating step forward that allowed me to take advantage of that. Manipulating my shadow while unable to move my hands to form seals was challenging, true, but –

"Monologuing," Itachi Uchiha tsked.

And then I saw black pinwheels on a sea of blood.

The sky turned red.

 _Crap._

"Shinobi prodigies never live happy lives," he said, a strange look of regret on his face. "You, Shikamaru Nara, really are too smart for your own good."

I was strapped down to a slanted table. Itachi Uchiha stood over me, his colors inverted in a strange mockery of himself. In one hand he held a bucket of black water, and in the other, a red cloth. "I can see your soul, Shikamaru Nara. You're afraid of drowning. A reasonable fear, but we all must learn to face our fears, do we not?"

He leaned over me, so close our noses almost touched.

"It's nothing personal. You remind me of myself, actually."

The cloth went over my face. The bucket dangled in the air.

"Before everything went so. Horribly. _Wrong._ "

And then −

 _I CAN'T BREATHE I CAN'T BREATHE ICANTBREATHEICANTBREATHEICANTBREATHE –_

How much time had passed? One minute? Two?

 _OH GODS I CAN'T BREATHE_

 _OHGODSIMGOINGTODIE –_

The deluge of water stopped. The cloth was yanked away from my face. _Air._ I gasped and retched, not caring about the bruises where the restraints had dug into my ankles and wrists where I had struggled too hard, only that _I have air the black water is gone I'm breathingbreathingBREATHING again −_

"That," he said, "was one second of the Tsukuyomi."

The cloth went back over my face.

 _Oh no oh no ohgodsno_

"Only two days, twenty-three hours, fifty-nine minutes, and fifty-nine seconds left to go."

* * *

 **A/N: This looks like a good place to end the chapter.**


	29. Shards and Splinters

BONUS #24

Is on the forum at fanfiction [dotnet] /forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/

* * *

 _The Tsukuyomi_

"Two days, twenty-three hours, fifty-nine minutes, and fifty-eight seconds…"

"Two days, twenty-three hours, fifty-nine minutes…"

"Two days, twenty-three hours..."

I didn't know where I was anymore. All I saw was blackness surrounding me – suspended by a sensation of semi-consciousness, half-alive and half-dead.

Unless you have actually felt it, you cannot possibly understand how terrifying drowning is. The need for air is the most basic one of life, and to be cut off from that triggers one of the basest, most intrinsic fears hard-wired into our brains. It takes away your humanity, your intelligence, your soul, and leaves behind nothing but the most primitive instincts your body can muster.

 _Air – AIR −_

I would have preferred burning alive or freezing to death than drowning for three days straight. Or however long it felt like.

It wouldn't be so bad if I was actually drowning. Because then I would black out after the first few minutes. And then it would be all over. I wouldn't have to feel or worry anymore. I would just be gone.

Death isn't so bad. It's incomprehensible, the nothingness, but it's not _bad_. I wouldn't mind being dead, when my time came, if only so I could finally understand what nonexistence really was.

But I was denied even this. Allowed neither escape nor release – only suspended in animalistic desperation. Clawing, fighting, crying for air that would not come. And I could do nothing but lie here and wait for it to end.

"Two days…"

 _Why me?_

The question popped up out of nowhere. A common one, as most people are liable to ask themselves when in a situation of undeserved suffering. But useless

Except in cases where it was not meant to be rhetorical.

 _Why me, indeed?_

Was he torturing me for _fun_ , so he could show me how powerless I was? Because he couldn't possibly have any practical reason for using one of his greatest techniques, on me, a twelve-year-old rookie Genin, no matter how smart I was.

He was trying to break me. To ruin me completely.

I don't know how hard it is to keep a level head while being tortured. I suppose it varies from person to person. What I did know was this: observation, strategy, _thinking_ – control of my own head − was as instinctual to me as survival was, because thinking _was_ living. Even if he turned me into a sack of mush, I would still be Shikamaru Nara, and I would not bow to him.

 _To fight a technique, one must understand it first._

What did I understand?

 _It's a genjutsu._

Oh, brilliant deduction. _No wonder they call you a genius,_ I snapped to myself.

 _Funny,_ my brain said. _The very fact that it's a genjutsu should be all the information you need._

 _What…?_

It was as another submersion started that I started to appreciate how interesting this entire genjutsu was. I had never seen nor heard of something so powerful. Some things affected the regular five senses, but they only superficially tricked the brain. To manipulate time, one had to directly manipulate interior of the mind itself…

…and this entire genjutsu depended on its ability to manipulate time.

He was inside my head. The bastard was inside my head. _This was all inside my head._ Even as my lungs filled with water and panic overtook every fiber of my body, there was still one tiny part of me that hadn't yet been conquered by my fear of death – and that was my desire to live.

I knew that if I had to endure the entire thing I would certainly go mad. I did not count madness as living. In fact, I would rather die than go on with a broken mind.

It was this thought that brought me back some semblance of sanity. One fear, conquered by an even greater one. What was the point of being alive, if I wasn't going to be myself anymore −

 _Hey, remember when you were talking to Anko about Orochimaru? You think something like this might do the trick –_

 _Shut UP!_

Because this couldn't be real. None of this was real. Who had the time to stand around and hold a genjutsu for three days straight? I was not drowning. I was not here.

 _Of course. It's a genjutsu. An illusion. It isn't real._

 _IT ISN'T REAL! THIS IS ALL INSIDE YOUR HEAD!_

 _Congratulations. Full marks._

 _Are you going to focus on useful solutions, or are you going to sit there and snark at yourself while a psychopath drowns you inside your own mind?_

There were two ways to disrupt a genjutsu. The first was to attack the illusion itself. All genjutsu had one thing in common: they were not real. It sounds obvious, but it's a very significant thing. Like monsters under a child's bed, all one had to do to break is grip was to force oneself to stop believing in it.

That was why genjutsu targeted the areas of the brain outside of conscious control. There is no automatic switch to shut off one's eyesight, or hearing, or pain receptors, at will. Your frontal lobe might not believe in it, but as long as one part of your brain did…It's a deathly realistic nightmare, when you are sure everything's fake and now you're just trying to convince the rest of your uncooperative body to _wake the fuck up_.

Physical harm usually worked. The natural response was to acknowledge the site of injury, and thus, acknowledge the world outside of the illusion. But certain things were strong enough that even pain didn't get rid of it completely, such as Sakura's auditory genjutsu.

And Tsukuyomi controlled every sense, as well as my sense of time, which was why it was so powerful. If it's hard enough to convince your ears to stop hearing things, then it's downright impossible to convince yourself time isn't real.

Until you can.

Because I, the real me, in the _real present_ ,was still standing on solid ground, with completely dry lungs, and my shadow –

− my shadow was still connected to him.

 _My shadow was still connected to him._ Out of the suffocating darkness I remembered, with blazing clarity, exactly where we had left off right before this all started. I could not see it, I could not feel it, but I _knew_ , with absolute certainty, that my shadow had not abandoned me.

The Kagemane drained chakra at a steady rate. It didn't matter if I couldn't use it in here – the fact that I still _had_ the same exact amount of chakra since we started was damning enough to the integrity of the Tsukuyomi.

"Two days, twenty-three hours, fifty-nine minutes, and forty-nine seconds remaining," he said, in the patronizing tone of a nurse giving a child a shot. He raised his arm to replace the wet cloth over my face.

 _Ino, lend me your knowledge; Sensei, lend me your cunning; Naruto, lend me your brazen disregard for the impossible._

I smiled and flared my chakra.

* * *

Itachi regretted that the boy felt pain. He did not regret that he was the one causing it. "You're doing very well, Shikamaru Nara. Most people would be incoherent by now."

The boy was smiling.

Itachi felt his heel sting. Odd. He shouldn't be feeling anything in the Tsukuyomi.

How unusual −

"I'm not Shikamaru, foolish older brother."

Itachi froze. As did the entire world, the water from the bucket still suspended halfway in the stinging sensation on his heel became sharper.

" _…What?_ "

He reached out to the Nara boy again. Surely that was him. Yes, it _was_ him. This wasn't right −

"Shikamaru holds you," said the boy. "You forgot me."

Itachi's stomach turned to ice. _Sasuke?_

"They thought they hid me, but they hid Choji. I thought you were smarter than that. Did you think were the only one in the world who could use the Tsukuyomi?"

 _But when? Who did he see die?_

 _You're kidding, right? You murdered his whole family and made him watch; there was bound to be the one he loved most in there._

 _Mother, then. He always liked her best._

This had to be a trick. But when Itachi tried to draw upon all the possibilities, he came up blank. The pain at his feet was definitely chakra. _How did he find me? He shouldn't have any access to the outside world in here. He shouldn't even be able to speak._

The boy smirked. "Now for the _real_ question: _whose_ Tsukuyomi is this?"

 _Mine, of course._ He betrayed nothing, but somehow the boy read his blank face.

"Are you _sure_?"

 _Yes, I'm sure._

"Positive?"

 _Yes._

"Really?"

… _Yes?_

The world flickered as he felt his concentration waver.

"The Tsukuyomi is a only a genjutsu, after all. Foolish older brother, how do _you_ know what reality is, when your life is built on lies?"

The stab of chakra against his feet became insistently painful, and for the first time in many years, Itachi felt the crippling poison of self-doubt again. He thought it had been beaten out of him by his captain when he was just an ANBU trainee (the hazing, the lying, the dreaded psychological tricks… _Damn you, senpai; I thought I left you and your mind games behind!_ ), but apparently not.

Itachi, normally the one to hold the cards, now felt a nagging fear that he was, in reality, lagging so far behind he didn't even know he was losing. Logic agreed that the chance was all too real: chakra that was not his own, burning at his heels, even though the Tsukuyomi could neutralize even the strongest men; his victim, supposedly helpless, smiling smugly like he'd already won. _It's a trap. It has to be._

He could not remain here and leave himself vulnerable.

The Tsukuyomi hummed and buzzed like a vibrating sheet of glass.

It shattered in his face −

* * *

and

I

was

 _free_

I screamed like a wounded animal. My knees hit hard gravel. I collapsed to the ground, panting. _Free._ I could see colors again. Blue sky, painted buildings, green plants.

 _He fell for it._

 _He actually fell for it._

The other way to break a genjutsu was to attack the caster. If his immersion broke, so would his illusions.

Reaching Itachi from inside the Tsukuyomi was impossible. Conveniently, I'd latched on to him before it started. The Kagemane ensured that my chakra would be able to find him, even if I could not.

A tiny spark wouldn't do any damage, but that wasn't the point. The point was to lend my lies a basis in reality. Someone you believe to be at your mercy acting uncharacteristically smugly could be dismissed as a bluff. Physical evidence, however, couldn't be ignored.

I would have done the same in his situation; only an idiot would continue walking into an obvious trap.

 _If only the obvious trap was real._

His attacks were fake, and so were mine. Psychological warfare against more of the same; it was only fair. Turns out Sasuke had the same effect on Itachi as my father's reputation had on me. At best nothing would happen; at worst he would have been ambushed between _two_ different Tsukuyomi. There was no logical action but to err on the side of caution, and break the illusion himself.

 _Freeing me in the process._

But the euphoria of winning quickly gave way to fear and anger as I took in my surroundings. Asuma-sensei and Kurenai-sensei were still dying. Choji was still here, in harm's way. And I had used up my one advantage on Itachi; he wouldn't fall for that again.

My shadow tensed. I looked across the ground, to where it was still attached to Itachi Uchiha. It snapped like a rubber band, flying back at me with so much force I fell over again. In two strides Itachi was before me, his hand fisted in my collar. With a sharp jerk he yanked me back up to my feet and held me before him.

Though I could feel his breath on my face, I kept my eyes resolutely closed this time.

"Sasuke was never here. You were bluffing the whole time," he realized. If there was any shock from before, it had been entirely replaced with the true discipline of a warrior − tranquil fury laced his voice like steel. "You _used_ my brother against me – "

"And if I did? One lie for another. After what you've done you still call him _brother_?You're a disgusting psychopath who gets off on watching people suffer," I spat, "because I don't understand how this could possibly help your supposed goal − "

"Stop," he ordered, "right now."

I shakily drew a kunai, even though I was in zero condition to wield it. " _Make me_."

He grabbed me before I could plunge it into his gut, as I knew he would. But I refused to drop the knife, even when he twisted my wrist so hard I thought he might break it.

"I have my reasons," he hissed in my ear, "for what you rightfully call a stupid plan that was bound to fail. And I will not tell them to you."

"Bugger that," I snapped. "What was _this_ for? There's nothing I could have told you, and even if my sensei came, he'd slit his own belly before betraying Naruto, you _imbecile_ – "

His grip around my neck tightened. _Go ahead and snap it,_ I thought. _Even if you kill me, you've still lost. I may have made up those things about Sasuke, but you'll still lie awake fearing the day they come true for the rest of your short miserable life._

"You mentally destroyed someone who only ever blindly loved you. Then you conspired to kidnap and murder a kid whose life was just starting to be something other than complete crap. And now you waste 'the most powerful genjutsu in existence' on a _Genin_!" my voice rose to a shout. " _What the hell is wrong with you?_ "

My windpipe constricted beneath his fingers.

 _Is this the end for me?_

But instead, his hands went slack, and he let me collapse onto the ground in an undignified heap once more.

Then he began laughing.

Not the crazed cackle of a monster, but the broken chuckle of a man who had forgotten what happiness was.

" _Everything_."

I heard people approaching. Jiraiya, Tsunade, and Yamato's voices in a jumble of others. It occurred to me that this entire exchange – starting from the confrontation, to Kisame nearly killing Asuma-sensei and Kurenai-sensei, to Itachi's mind trip – took less than thirty seconds.

"May you die as you lived," I said softly, and I was surprised to hear how much malice I could pack into a polite whisper.

He didn't seem to care. He was still laughing. "I was asking the wrong question all along," he said. "It's not if you're good _enough_. It's if you're _too_ good."

I bristled. "What are you going on about now?"

His laughter died down to a rueful smile. "If you really think you can do more good than harm, go ahead. Play all the games you want. But remember this: nothing in this world is completely pure, not even love. I once stood in your place and look at me now. You do not know the limits of what you are willing to do for them until you have become something even they cannot love in return. If you ever get there then know you can never go back. The ends rarely justify the means, Shikamaru Nara. I hope you remember that."

Was I hallucinating again? _Kai_ , I whispered to myself, but he didn't disappear. Maybe I was still stuck in the Tsukuyomi. Maybe this was all a bad dream, and I would wake up at home in bed.

"If you're implying I'll end up like you, you're mad," I shot back defiantly. "I would never torture children, _especially_ not one that _obviously_ had _nothing of value_ to tell me!" I could feel my strength fading, the unconsciousness creeping around my head. If he wanted to slit my throat now, he could. I certainly wouldn't be able to stop him.

But he only shook his head. "Some things cut deeper than swords."

He and Kisame disappeared into my darkening fields of vision.

* * *

 _Konoha Central Hospital_

They had to suspend Asuma-sensei in a special cot because his spine was partially fractured. Nothing Tsunade couldn't heal, but still.

Sasuke clenched his fists so hard his nails left little bloody crescents in the crooks of his palms; he was that angry. Asuma-sensei had gotten hurt because of _them_ – because of _him_ –

Kurenai-sensei, too. And her situation was worse. Asuma-sensei's injuries had been more severe but easier to heal. Kurenai-sensei, however, had been stabbed in the gut, and there was a chance she'd have to end up using a surrogate or adopting…

"Only" four people were seriously hurt that day, if you didn't count the Chunin on firefighting duty hospitalized for smoke inhalation. "Only" four. Asuma-sensei, Kurenai-sensei, Shikamaru, and another ANBU Itachi had interrogated before the fire started. They acted like it was a _miracle_ that it hadn't been more.

 _Miracle, my ass. They're only saying that because it wasn't personal._

Sasuke crossed the hallway, where he could see Choji, still blubbering. "I was standing right there. We've been friends since we could walk, and I didn't do anything when those creepy eyes turned on. Sasuke, what now? Asuma-sensei and Kurenai-sensei can't do anything for at least a month, and Ino told me something was up with her sensei, too. That's all three of the rookie teachers gone – "

That was all he could get out, though, because at that moment, Ino shouted from inside the room, "He's awake! He's awake!"

Immediately, Choji stopped sniffling and charged through the doorway, faster than one might expect for someone of his size. "Shikamaru!"

"Time," Shikamaru muttered groggily.

"Past six," Ino provided. "You've been out for hours."

"Even with my help it should have left him out of it for several _days_ ," Tsunade said in wonder.

"I only got about ten seconds," Shikamaru said. "Well, more like ten minutes, since each second was a minute. Could have been worse."

His sensei looked absolutely terrible. "I should have been there for you."

Jiraiya snorted. "And what would you have done?"

"I left him behind; was that not clear?" Kakashi-sensei's voice rose. "I had Naruto and Ino with me, and instead of finding Shikamaru, I made a _conscious decision_ to leave a teammate behind! Do I have to remind you what happened the _last_ time I did that – "

 _SLAP._

Sasuke jumped in shock. Genin were the ones who got smacked around, not seasoned Jonin. That would be like – like Asuma-sensei getting caned by the Hokage himself.

"Listen, you neurotic fool," Jiraiya snarled, "do you know how long it took them to find and take down two of our best Jonin?"

Kakashi-sensei shook his head.

"Less than five minutes."

A chill fell over the room.

Kakashi-sensei turned slowly to face a man Sasuke didn't recognize. "Is that true, Yamato?"

Yamato nodded. "I went looking for Shikamaru as soon as you had left with your batch. In the few seconds it took me between spotting the fight and entering it, they were already gone."

"And do you know what they were doing before that?" Jiraiya asked. At the silence, he answered darkly, "They went and checked the very place we were initially going to hide those kids first."

Sasuke could feel his blood pounding in his ears. _Were we really that close to death?_

Jiraiya crossed his arms. "So do you know what would have happened, had you chosen to take the time to go find Shikamaru? And let the ANBU take Naruto?"

"I – "

"Naruto would have been captured, Sasuke might have been killed, and either way you'd have been left with dead kids. You did the best you could realistically do in this situation. Stop beating yourself up over something you couldn't help, and just be glad that things turned out as well as they did!" Jiraiya roared.

"But I _could_ have helped! I could have told those ANBU where to go, and then – "

"Would they have listened? Would they have gotten Naruto to the right place in time? If they got caught, would they have survived interrogation? Would _you_ have gotten to Shikamaru in time? And what would you have done then? Stood there like an idiot?" Jiraiya shot the questions out, one after another. "Sometimes, you have to accept that you can't be good enough."

The defeated way in which one of the Legendary Sannin said this seemed to destroy Naruto's sensei – but not as much as it destroyed Sasuke.

He sat down on the chair by Shikamaru's bed and pulled his knees up to his chin. Sasuke was vaguely aware that Ino and Naruto were watching, but he hardly cared. He needed to get this off his chest.

"He did it to me, too."

He didn't know why he was saying this. Maybe it was because now there was another survivor of Itachi's nightmares he could talk to, someone who might understand. The "adults" were still going back and forth about what was and wasn't possible, who should substitute teach the Rookie Genin…

This was all his fault. If only he'd finished Itachi off sooner, this wouldn't be happening. So what if Naruto had been their primary target. It wasn't as if Naruto _chose_ his life – but it _was_ Sasuke's responsibility to finish what Itachi had started.

"He made me watch my family getting murdered. And I could do nothing but stand there helplessly as everyone I loved was slaughtered before my eyes over and over and _over_ again. He cut off my mother's head and slit my father across the belly. He slashed all my aunts, uncles, cousins across the throat. Even the nice old lady who lived on the edge of the compound, who would pass out sweets to me when I went by…all of them. Gone."

"You watched that for those 'three' days?"

Sasuke nodded. Choji lay a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. "What did he do to you?"

Shikamaru shrugged. "Tied me down to a table, put a cloth on my face, and then poured water over me. A little scary, but not nearly as gory as yours."

Naruto interrupted, "'A little' scary? That sounds like waterboarding."

Shikamaru shifted uncomfortably. "…It _was_ waterboarding."

He knew Itachi was bad before – the bastard murdered his entire family – now here was another nail in his coffin. First, him. Now, Shikamaru. Who next? Choji? Hinata?

Sasuke blanched at the thought of Hinata having to go through even a fraction of what either of them had. He tried to form words with his mouth, but he was so _livid_ nothing came out. Nothing could describe the sheer amount of raw anger and hate that consumed him in this very moment.

 _He's going to pay. He's going to fucking pay._

* * *

 _The Hyuga Clan Compound_

 _You_ are _strong, Hinata. You just have no direction._

Tenten's words still rang in her mind.

 _Why does she think I'm strong? I always lose – to Neji, to my own little sister, to her. What makes her think I'm strong, when everyone else has called me weak?_

There were a few trees growing about the back of the Hyuga compound. Hinata poked one of them sadly. It was shorter than the rest. Maybe it had grown too slowly – or maybe it had started too late – but now it was impossible for it to get any healthier. All of the other trees around it had grown too tall and leafy to let any sunlight through to it. Hinata wished she could climb up to the top and trim the others, just a little, so that the smaller tree would be able to keep growing.

The little voices in her head laughed at her. _It won't help. Once a loser, always a loser. You were born weak, and you'll never be able to get better. Stop trying._

 _I know,_ Hinata thought. _You've told me this dozens of times. Every time you open your ugly mouth I always hear the same things. It's like you can't think of anything smarter to say._

Hinata hesitated. She was surprised – she didn't consider herself a resentful person, but the way that last thought had come out, you'd think she was.

And then Hinata realized that she _was_ resentful. Resentful that her family thought she wasn't worth anything. Resentful that they sneered at her for being without any skill one moment, then told her to stop trying the next, then wondered why she didn't improve. Resentful that all her life she was called weak. All because she refused to hit her own sister. All because she wasn't as fast or as strong as a boy a year older than she was.

She _hated_ it. She _hated_ it, and she hated _them_. She was _angry_ and she was just plain _sick_ of it. Tenten was right; she was better than this.

She ran. Away from the compound, away from the Clan, away from all of their stupid expectations and judgments and insults…She just wanted – to _hit_ something. Not even the Gentle Fist. Just _punch_ something, in the good, crude, old-fashioned way…

"Sasuke? What are you doing out here?"

Sasuke was standing near the rear gate, with a pack over his shoulder.

That _look_ on his face. It was pure, murderous hatred, and it terrified her. She hadn't seen it on him since months ago, before they all met Asuma-sensei. "Go away, Hinata."

"Why? What are you doing?" Like it or not, Sasuke was her teammate, just like Neji was her family, and she'd be stuck with them until circumstance otherwise dictated…

"Go. Away."

She figured it out quickly enough. "…Itachi. You're planning to go after him."

"I'll say this one more time, Hinata. Go. Away."

"You can't do that, Sasuke. Didn't you see what they did to Asuma-sensei? You're not ready! _We're_ not ready!" She stepped in front of him. "Are you planning to go after him alone? Did our sensei's lessons on teamwork mean _nothing_ to you?"

Sasuke shoved past her dismissively. "You don't understand _anything_. Stupid."

Hinata jaw dropped.

She had been called weak her whole life, and she was used to that. She didn't win fights and she could barely keep up with Choji when running.

But she wasn't _stupid_.

Before Hinata's brain could catch up to her body, she had already pulled back her arm and let it fly as hard as she could.

Her punch connected with Sasuke's face in a nice, hard, _satisfying_ CRACK. Sasuke went flying backwards through the air, and landed on the ground in the dirt some three meters away, nursing a very obviously broken nose. He lay there in a stupor for a few seconds, then slowly sat up, staring at her in a dazed wonder.

Hinata's first instinct was to apologize. Stutter out some lame excuse and cry.

But her anger wasn't gone yet. Plus, she didn't _feel_ like apologizing.

 _What would Tenten say?_

"Stupid, am I? Well, at least I'm not the one trying to walk through a gate blockaded off by every ANBU in the village," she hissed, Byakugan flaring. Horrible memories were flooding back – of a Cloud nin with a twisted smile, of her father screaming in anguish as her uncle died in his place. "And if you even do escape, don't you know what people do to kids like us? You'll be dead in a week – if the ANBU don't bring back your head separated from your body then some other bounty hunter will. Just hope they don't carve your eyes out from your skull, first! Next time you make one of your boneheaded decisions, think about how you're not the only person on the planet, and just who else might be affected by _your_ stupidity!"

Sasuke stared at her, mouth hanging open comically, shocked into speechlessness. She did a sharp pivot, and marched straight back to the Hyuga compound, leaving him still sitting in the dirt with a bloodied face.

As she passed by the rear garden, the stumpy, pale little tree came back into view again.

And suddenly, Hinata _hated_ it, too.

The next thing she knew, her knuckles were raw and bloodied, and nothing remained of the tree but a pile of splinters at her feet.

* * *

 **A/N: Shikamaru did not break the Tsukuyomi (that's impossible); he only psyched out Itachi into ending the technique _for_ him. Itachi is still stronger than him and could have killed Shikamaru after, had he chosen to.**

 **This chapter has fanart! All links are consolidated at: sites [period] google [** **dotcom] /view/boomvroomshroom** **(this page is also accessible from my profile).**


	30. The Best Revenge

BONUS #25: On the forum.

fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/154004684/1/Bonus-25-Ch-29-Commentary

* * *

 _Konoha, the rear gate_

Sasuke brought a hand up to his nose bewilderedly, only half-aware that he should probably try to stem the bleeding. With a sharp and painful twist, he managed to realign it, but it would definitely still sting in the morning.

His dark shirt was completely splattered with red, and he was fairly certain that his face didn't look much better. Above him, he heard some rasping laughter. For a second, there was a glimmer of a bone-white mask in the trees, and then it flickered out of sight again.

ANBU guards. Way too many of them to walk past…

On second thought, this whole plan had been very badly thrown together.

 _Yeah…I can't leave the village looking like this._

Scratch preferring Sakura or Ino over Hinata as the girl in the team – it was the quiet ones you had to watch out for.

In that moment, he almost hadn't even recognized her. It was like she was bipolar, or had an alter ego, or _something_.

Or maybe this had all been her from the very beginning.

Sasuke suddenly realized how much girls terrified him. You didn't see them coming. He felt as if he was back in the Academy again. One moment you thought you had found a good spot to eat your lunch in peace, and the next, they were all surrounding you begging you to marry them. Except that Hinata had punched him in the nose instead. One moment, he had thought he was home free, if Hinata was the only person who was going to chase after him, and the next, he was lying sprawled in the dirt with blood all over the front of his shirt.

 _You're going to get yourself killed, Sasuke,_ she had said – or something along those lines. And it was true. Well – maybe Konoha would be a little more forgiving if they caught him (when they caught him) – since, after all, he was a Genin, and he really wasn't betraying the village as much as he was just being rash and going after an enemy without any backup or proper training. But, now that logic had returned to him, it was apparent that he wasn't S-rank yet.

Which made him pretty angry, since he was almost thirteen, and at this age Itachi had been a few months away from ANBU captain…

 _Why can't I ever be good enough?_

 _At this rate, I'll never beat Itachi._

But he had to defeat Itachi. This wasn't just revenge anymore. Every day that man was still alive was another day some innocent person was in danger. There was no honor in letting a criminal run free and unpunished. If he himself did not exercise justice, how could he expect others to do the same?

He decided to head home and wait for another day. Only, instead of heading home, he found his feet taking him over to Choji's house instead. He didn't even know he was heading there until he found himself before the Akimichi clan compound.

Which was weird, because he could easily deal with a messed up nose by himself and it wasn't as if he already ate dinner there every day, anyway…

"What happened?"

Sasuke closed his eyes. "It was my fault."

"Got you pretty bad, didn't he?"

"She," Sasuke corrected, thankfully accepting the ice pack.

"What?" Choji asked. "You insult Naruto or something? Ino's been super overprotective of the boys ever since…you know."

"I didn't insult Naruto," Sasuke said, "but I might have accidentally called Hinata dumb in a fit of immature anger."

Choji put down his bag of chips slowly. "Oh you did not."

"I did. That's why I said it was my fault."

Choji sat down. "I think you better tell me the whole story here."

So he did. And Choji sat there, and listened. He never talked or argued or anything. Just listened with the same kind of quiet acceptance that Asuma-sensei did. All of Team 10 was like this every time he acted like an asshole, and it never failed to make him feel like the scum of the earth. Today, with Hinata, had been the first time one of them had ever responded with anything other than total understanding.

"…and I get why it's such a stupid idea, but what the hell can I do? _Sit_ here while he goes off and ruins _more_ lives?"

No response from Choji's end except for a _krntch-krntch_ of chip crumbs and wadded-up foil bags. Finally he said, "If you go after him when you're clearly not ready, you'll just be another casualty. Staying here doesn't mean _sitting_ here. We can keep training."

"But it's not enough! It's never enough! Didn't you see what they did to Asuma-sensei? He's – too – _strong_ – " Sasuke slammed his fist against the wall. "At this rate, I'll never beat him. What's the point of having friends if – " he let his arms drop to his sides. "I'm sorry, Choji. I don't mean to disrespect any of you. You've made my life more tolerable, and I wouldn't give any of that up. But how can I just stay weak? You guys might as well be open targets…"

Choji put a hand on his shoulder. "You're not weak, Sasuke."

"Compared to him, I am – "

"He's strong, but he's alone. He's got that fish-guy with him, and that's it. We'll get stronger together, Sasuke. And we'll beat him together. You can give him the finishing blow, but before that, we'll show him exactly what he's been missing all these years as a rogue nin. We'll remind him that he has no friends, and we'll let him know how happy he _could_ have been if he'd just stayed in the village like a normal person. I guarantee that will hurt him more than any torture."

Sasuke swallowed. "Okay."

"Good. We'll find Hinata and you can apologize later. Wanna spend the night?" The question came out of nowhere, as if they had just spent the past five minutes watching a cool movie instead of plotting how to murder someone. Sasuke was just glad that Choji was very good at pretending things were normal.

 _No,_ said Sasuke's pride. "Yes."

The best revenge, after all, was living well.

* * *

 _Training Ground 23R_

Naruto sat down in Yamato's nest of brambles and closed his eyes. In a short moment, he was face-to-face with the Kyuubi again. The fox still regarded him with a heavy mix of disgust and suspicion, but whatever anger it used to direct at him was now being aimed at the Akatsuki guys instead. Naruto hoped that maybe in the future, it would be something other than mutual hatred that ensured their friendship, but for now, a grudging cooperation was the best he could hope for.

"Well? Aren't you going to give me your chakra?" Naruto asked.

"Of course," the fox snarled, "if you want to _die_."

"If you don't give me your chakra, I'm _really_ going to die!"

The fox let out a bark of what might have passed as laughter for a demonic mass of chakra. "Suit yourself, then."

And Naruto's body flooded with what must have been liquid fire. He screamed out loud; it hurt so goddamn much. And the more he resisted, the worse the pain got, until Naruto thought he'd finally snap for sure. If he hadn't known better, he'd say the fox was trying to kill him.

Maybe it was.

But Naruto held on, against his better judgment, and all of a sudden the pain disappeared. He pasted on a cocky grin and shouted at the fox, "That the worst you can do?"

His false confidence, however, was quickly wiped away with the fox's ugly leer. Naruto didn't know how just one facial expression could promise so much hurt. "Not by a long shot."

Of course, his big mouth had to go, "Then why'd you stop?"

If Naruto could actually see the top of the fox's head, it was probably rolling its eyes right now. "If I had gone any further your chakra system would have overloaded, and then you'd be left as burnt up as your idiot teacher. And while that's all fine and dandy with me, it leaves the both of us vulnerable to those Akatsuki creeps."

Naruto wrinkled his nose. "Kakashi-sensei isn't an idiot."

"He is a human, ergo, he is an idiot."

"You got caught by _humans_ , therefore what are you…?"

Naruto was slapped by a biting gust of wind, and at the same time the pain returned tenfold…

…and then he was staring up into Yamato's terrified face. Jiraiya was staring openmouthed, shaking his head in disbelief.

"What?" he asked.

Yamato was the first to snap out of his state. "The first tail," he murmured.

Naruto turned around, and sure enough, there was a big concentrated stripe of scorched earth extending out from behind him. He jumped up in victory.

"Ha- _ha_! Take that, ya dumb fox! You said I couldn't do it!" he yelled at the sky.

"You were _screaming_ ," Yamato told him, and Naruto's dance was cut short. "I wanted to run in there and grab you; you were screaming like the world was going to end and you were going to die. Jiraiya stopped me."

Naruto wrinkled his nose at the newcomer. "Wait, I know you! You're that guy Kakashi-sensei left with, to find Tsunade!"

Jiraiya grinned and struck a pose. "The one and only gallant Jiraiya, to you! Sage of Toads and Master of Everything! So bow down and pay your respects!"

"Whatever, old man!" Naruto crossed his arms and turned away with his nose in the air. "Dogs are better than toads anyway!"

Jiraiya's jaw fell open in horror. Yamato was rolling on the ground.

"You did _not_ just say that."

"Say what? That dogs are better than toads?" Naruto asked again.

Jiraiya sank to his knees, cradling his head in his hands. "Oh gods, he's _turned_ you!"

Naruto didn't know what to make of that, so he just cleared his throat. "Yeah, yeah, whatever. Why are you here, old man?"

At this, Jiraiya pulled himself off the ground and made himself respectable again. "Ah. That is a more serious matter. Same reason why we're making you train with the fox early. We can't risk anything happening to you, and given the level of our opponents, a standard ANBU squad is no longer good enough. Which is why you're moving in with me."

Naruto tilted his head to the side. It sounded too good to be true. "As in, your house?"

"Yes. An actual house, not your little apartment anymore."

"What's the catch?"

"I can't let you out of my sight." _Like a prisoner._ "But it's not like I'll be holding your hand crossing the street. That would be overbearing. Just know that you will be shadowed. I'll go over a code system with you, if you want to get some privacy."

"Will this be forever?" Naruto couldn't help asking.

Jiraiya surveyed the training grounds. "At least until you get the ninth tail down. By then, hopefully, your whole team will be enough to keep you safe. You're making good progress, but you've got a long way to go, kid."

"Huh," Naruto scratched the back of his head. "Was it that bad?"

"It will only get worse," Jiraiya muttered. "This is how all jinchuuriki must learn to master their tailed beasts. Consistent exposure to the poisonous chakra, pushing your body to its limits, until you can finally take it – or die in the process. Most don't, seeing as the vessels are specifically chosen to be compatible, but – I've heard of it happening a few times, before. When desperate villages attempt to force an incompatible host."

"That's just the same as training to run long distances!" Naruto said. "Apart from the whole dying thing. But Gai and Lee do it all the time! You run until you drop, and then the next day, you run that same amount plus another step! That fox ain't got nothin' on me!"

"I'm glad to hear that," Jiraiya said, leading him inside, "because each successive tail is said to be ten times worse than the last. The road is long and hard for jinchuuriki, and as the holder of the Kyuubi, yours will be the worst of all."

Naruto folded his hands behind his head. "Well, it's a very good thing I'm not a wimp, right?"

Jiraiya ruffled his hair. "That's right, Naruto."

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

 _SMACK._

I hissed in pain as Kakashi-sensei kicked the back of my knee. This fight was grossly unfair; Kakashi-sensei was already difficult enough without being blindfolded. But I'd insisted on this – learning to fight while vision-impaired. I wasn't going to let my fate hinge on circumstance.

And with Kakashi-sensei wobbling back and forth between silently blaming himself for a thing he couldn't have controlled and training, I preferred the latter. According to Ino, people who grew up in harsh conditions associated love with "brutally ensuring" our survival.

"You will live," he told all of us. "You _will_ live, because you _have to_."

I didn't know if I was going to be that lucky if we met again, so this was the alternative. I couldn't let Itachi Uchiha trap me twice.

A beastly part of me wanted to do nothing more than to personally hunt down each and every one of those guys. I don't know what held me back. Was it Anko's voice, telling me if I didn't stop being a control freak I'd drive myself madder than the Tsukuyomi? Was it Itachi's haunted laughter, giving me a horrifying glimpse of what I'd callously thought was a good eternity for Orochimaru…or myself?

I felt the the telltale flutter of air signaling a presence next to my cheek, and ducked. The punch passed over my head harmlessly. _Now I know where you are._ I extended my hand −

 _WHUMP._ An elbow, into my gut. Foot, beneath my knees.

 _Flip_.

I flew through the air and hit the ground, barely managing to break my fall. Harder than it sounds, when you don't know where the floor is.

Ino was faring better than me at this. I wasn't one bit surprised; her whole family was made up of natural sensors, after all.

Perhaps, when she finally mastered her family's mental communication techniques…we might stand a chance after all. I knew most people didn't regard Ino as very dangerous, compared to a powerhouse like Naruto or someone with my track record, but…when it came to strange nin with unknown powers, she was my greatest ally.

You wouldn't be able to tell, based on rank alone. No one from our group made it to Chunin, as Kakashi-sensei predicted. We _had_ been surprised to find out, however, that everyone who made it past the second test was eligible for a field promotion at the discretion of their jonin sensei, meaning none of us had to take the exams a second time.

I don't know how that concession had been wrangled out of the Hokage, but I imagine it must have involved a lot of guilt-tripping. Not that it would help Team 7 anytime soon. Kakashi-sensei would keep us Genin forever if he could.

As I sat down to rest, I couldn't help but think about how sharply my personal freedom had decreased. Orochimaru could be pointed to a fluke, but two missing-nin were no joke. Even if I had survived both encounters – my parents and Kakashi-sensei were adamant that there would not be a third.

Not that they could protect me forever, but I suppose I appreciated their sentiment. The Akatsuki struck closer to home than Orochimaru. With Orochimaru, Sasuke was the main goal; it was just bad timing that we were in the same location. It was the opposite with the Akatsuki. They were actively trying to kill Naruto, and despite the fact that Itachi Uchiha was involved, he didn't seem too interested in going after Sasuke.

And it could be worse, I guess. I could be like Sasuke. Or Naruto. I knew he was happy that he finally had a parent-ish figure, even if Jiraiya was more like the irresponsible uncle than a father, but at the same time, I could see his annoyance at having to be protected all the time. I knew Naruto's type; in his mind he was supposed to be the one standing in front, protecting his friends. It must be hard for him, to be told that until he was ready, the only way _to_ protect his friends was to hide in the back.

We rarely saw Naruto outside of our regular team meetings anymore. All of his waking moments were now spent in Yamato's "special training". (As if we were stupid enough to believe it was anything other than mastering the Kyuubi.) Ino retreated to her clan techniques in her private time, and, as I was forbidden from _my_ special training, continued to expand my network. I found an ally with Ebisu, who was thankful for my help in keeping the Konohamaru Corps in line. Beneath his dour exterior, Ebisu was a skilled, trustworthy man.

At least Team 7 still did missions together. All of them inside the village, or within running distance of the walls. I looked forward to those very much, even if they were just menial C-ranks in the mission office. It made me feel like everything was normal, just the four of us in Team 7 causing the usual trouble.

I later learned from Choji that during this time period, Teams 8 and 10 had been temporarily shuffled over under Raidou and Genma while waiting for Asuma-sensei and Kurenai-sensei to recover. Team 7 only managed to stay together because Kakashi-sensei bribed every Chunin in the front office with perfect and neat reports for a week (it turned out he _was_ capable of writing legibly when he tried) if they "misplaced" the Jonin instructor transfer sheets.

The Sandaime could have forced a transfer without the papers, if he really wanted to, but he was the sort of man to pick his battles wisely, and I bet arguing with Kakashi-sensei wasn't worth it. Better to indulge his whims, because even in his weakened state, Kakashi-sensei was entirely capable of training us to death.

Also, they didn't think anyone could get too hurt doing paperwork.

I wish I had a funny "they were so very wrong" story involving to tell you, but I don't. We behaved ourselves. Unless you counted that one time involving the coffee machine, Tora, and food coloring, but that was hardly my fault.

Like a true friend, however, I took the blame for what had been Izumo and Kotetsu's idea. In return, they let me help them with some of their higher-clearance work, even though I was only a Genin. One of my favorite duties was reading classified mission reports before marking up the important bits with black highlighter. Those were fun. And useful.

I would like to reiterate that I stood up for Izumo and Kotetsu because I liked them, and not because of any strategic maneuvering on my part. That I knew the Hokage would let me off lightly because I was of lower rank and had recently undergone a "traumatic experience" is only coincidental and highly irrelevant.

* * *

 _Amegakure_

"Itachi. I see you have returned empty-handed," Pein said.

"Konoha is well-fortified," Itachi shrugged. This was the truth. "Their jinchuuriki were far better watched over than the rogue travelers you sent the others to get. Our plan did work, right up until the very end, when one of their own Jonin made a snap decision to completely disregard their own regulations."

"There's always one of those guys in every village," Deidara harrumphed.

"Like you, for example," said Sasori.

"You're just jealous because we captured ours and you didn't!" Hidan yelled.

"Is this true, Kisame?" Pein asked, completely ignoring the others.

"Yeah," said Kisame. "We spied on a bunch of ANBU beforehand, and again when we started the fire."

"Itachi might have made a mistake," Konan said coolly.

"I doubt it," said Pein. "Itachi would not make mistakes."

"Even the gods fear Lady Luck," said Itachi. "It just so happens that the Kyuubi jinchuuriki's Jonin sensei practically lives on psychological warfare and insubordination, and will continue to do so as long as his success rate prevents him from being harshly disciplined."

 _And I would know; I trained and worked with him for a number of years. He does not cause as much fear as I do, but he is annoying enough to compensate. Even the most intelligent of shinobi can feel stupid after facing his traps, and thus lose their minds to frustration._

 _I have a feeling his students will end up being the same. Shikamaru Nara…you are lucky I plan to leave you out of my report. What I did to you was bad enough. What our warlike world will do to you is worse._

"You are telling me one Jonin was enough to override the decisions of the Hokage and his ANBU?" Pein asked. "Somehow I think you are making excuses."

"I _am_ making excuses. That does not mean they are lies," said Itachi. "You've heard his name, but until you've trained under him personally you cannot possibly hope to understand him. He argues like an aged politician and whines with all the illogical stubbornness of a spoiled five-year-old." Better to exaggerate someone he knew could take care of himself, than shift the blame on a child he'd already wronged.

 _Shikamaru Nara._ He was already learning his teacher's tricks better than Itachi ever had. Their encounter still chilled Itachi at night, when he lay awake with nothing but his own dark thoughts to keep him company.

 _He knew what he was doing, just as I knew what I was doing, attacking his fears._ For so long he'd fantasized about Sasuke giving him a pure death. The one good thing he might gain from all this. Now, even that tiny joy was taken from him. He could not banish the thought of his younger brother destroying him with the Tsukuyomi instead of a sword. Leaving him a life of misery instead of dying a quick, clean death.

 _Sasuke might very well do that. I would deserve it._

That hurt more than anything else.

"And 'sides, the attack wasn't completely unsuccessful," Kisame grinned. "We managed to severely injure two Jonin sensei – the Hokage's son and his girlfriend."

"They're 'not dating'," Itachi corrected Kisame. "They've _been_ 'not dating' since I was a Genin."

The conversation was going nowhere, so Pein dismissed everyone. For a moment Itachi had been hopeful that the order included him, but then he saw the figure lurking in the back, glaring at him. Sighing, he abandoned his futile plan to escape.

Itachi knew his mysterious benefactor possessed the Sharingan, though he'd only ever seen one of the man's eyes at a time. What his face was like was unknown. For all Itachi knew, 'he' was actually a very tall woman using a jutsu to change her voice.

"You're a frightfully good actor, Itachi," said Madara-Tobi. "One might almost believe you when you claim you did not fail on purpose."

The hairs on the back of Itachi's neck stood up, though he hardly showed it. No sense in lying; he was dead either way. "I did."

Madara-Tobi seemed surprised at his willing admission. "You swore to serve the Akatsuki."

 _Let's see if I can talk my way out of this one._ "And in return, you swore to leave Konoha for last. I even murdered my own clan to seal the deal, and this is how you honor your word. By attacking the children first. I betrayed no one, because we were not supposed to be there in the first place. Not yet."

"That does not change the fact that you sabotaged a mission you were directly ordered to complete," Madara-Tobi argued.

"I sabotaged nothing," Itachi insisted tonelessly. _Play the reasonable one here. And you might just walk out of this alive._ "Your direct order conflicted with an different one – to uphold my deal to you. I determined that our long-term contract was more important than this short-term order, and took steps to ensure the durability of our bargain."

"That is a highly diplomatic way of describing blatant failure," Madara-Tobi commented.

"Kill me if you like," Itachi shrugged nonchalantly, even though on the inside he wanted oh so desperately to live. _It's not about the value of my own life. But I cannot die yet. That honor must go to Sasuke, and Sasuke alone._ "It won't make a difference. Konoha knows we are here and they are training the boy as we speak. You have no choice but to delay your attack on Konoha anyway. All you can hope to do now, is either eliminate me for good, or trust that I will continue to help you regarding the jinchuuriki from all the other villages."

Madara-Tobi glared at him. Finally, he snarled, "I don't want to see this behavior from you again. Dismissed."

* * *

 **He was right, you know. About your impatience,** Black Zetsu said quietly. His – her? – its? voice dripped in half-high, half-low tones, like it was several people speaking at once. It reminded Tobi of water. Not clear, flowing streams, but rancid, stagnant puddles in a leaky sewer. **It's a wonder you're still alive, honestly.**

"Shut up," Tobi muttered. "Just shut up."

 **Well, Konoha is now preparing yet another child for war. If war is what they want, war is what they shall have.**

"And you call me impatient? Even I can tell we're not ready yet – "

 **Not with the Akatsuki, you numbskull. With each other. It has been a generation; another shinobi war was bound to happen sooner or later. Konoha got lucky once, avoiding death by sand snake. But their good fortune won't last.**

"No, I suppose not," said Tobi. "Very well. I'll have a word with the Mizukage. The Mist nin have always been good at keeping quiet."

 **Yes, and policing each other, as well. Dead men tell no tales.**

Tobi snorted. "You know I hate those bastards more than any of the villages."

 **Even more than Iwa?** Black Zetsu asked, like he-she-it didn't know the answer already. It knew the story even if it hadn't been there with him, because it knew everything. Every memory of the world found its way home to that inky black shadow sooner or later.

"Yes," said Tobi. "Even more than Iwa."

His broken bones were a world away now. He ran a hand over the lumpy, malformed half of his body, wondering if _she_ would be disgusted with him if she could see him now. Only the dreams of the clearing, the ring of scowling Jonin, the blood and the death remained. _Myself, I don't care. The wounds Iwa gave me have healed. The wounds Kiri gave me will not._

* * *

 **A/N: Show of hands; are you okay with reading the boldfaced text?**

 ***Please answer this question guys. If you don't care, just say 'yes'.**


	31. Once More on the Road

BONUS #26

[www] fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/154518547/1/Bonus-26-More-on-Sasuke-and-Hinata

* * *

 _ANBU Maximum Security Containment Complex 41-East_

 _Row 8D_

"I have more water for you, Gaara-san. Are you feeling all right? I know it must be hard being cooped up in here, but we'll be letting you out soon enough; don't you worry."

They kept promising him soon, but Gaara didn't know when that was.

The first few days were hard – Mother (the Ichibi, they called it) no longer spoke to him, and the emptiness nearly drove him mad. There was no sand to be found in his soft plastic cell, but even if there were it would have done little good against these people. The clear plastic wall separating him from the others was lined with strange seals that kept his chakra contained. They were scared of him; it was why they had that there. Justified, though, in that he would have murdered them all otherwise.

And yet they kept coming down. Gaara didn't understand these people at all. Why weren't they running away, screaming? He was expecting them to. Or at least, he had expected them to try to kill him, while he was weak and Mother wasn't there to help him. But no. Nothing happened. They just…sent people down. Every day, at least once, like clockwork (they were his clocks, for there were no clocks here), they would send someone – sometimes a group of people – down to talk to him. And after a short while, those people would leave.

Gaara had suspected some sort of trick at first, but when nothing happened, he realized that that was all they were doing. They were just _talking._ It was very odd. Gaara never talked in this way before. As in, making conversation for the sake of conversation. He only said what needed to be said, no more, no less, and that was that.

They never ventured past the black line, for beyond the black line was his domain (and Mother's, if Mother ever woke up), but they talked to him, and asked him questions. Not like an interrogation; they left Suna alone. It would have been easier if they had; he had been trained for something like that. But they didn't seem interested in his village's secrets.

They were asking questions about _him_.

Gaara had been surprised to find out that he didn't know any of the answers to them.

"What is your favorite color, Gaara?" they had asked him once, like it had mattered. "What is your favorite place to be? Do you like the desert, or the forests, or mountains, or oceans, or rock canyons? Your opinion matters to us, Gaara."

Gaara hadn't known the answer to that, either. Growing up the way he had, he didn't have a preference for many things. Avoiding assassination by his father's men, and killing people...that had been the extent of his worries.

Had he really been so simple-minded?

Gaara had grown up in a desert, so he was most _used_ to that landscape, but that didn't mean that he _liked_ it. He had never seen mountains or the ocean before, so he had no idea what that was like. In the end, they had let him try out a little bit of each – somehow, they managed to change the wallpaper of his room – because it was more like a room than a jail cell – so that it looked like he was staring out at said landscapes. Probably a minor genjutsu, except that _Kai_ did not disperse it.

The desert was boring. He had already seen too much of it. He didn't like the mountains or rock canyons. They were craggy and gray and ugly. Not that he was much of a judge for what was ugly and what wasn't, but he just didn't like them. The ocean was basically a wall of mist every day. And so, of the five landscapes he had to choose from, the forest was the most bearable. It was nice and soothing and calming, and an interesting change of view to a boy from a land where trees were small enough to fit in pots.

"Do you know what your favorite color is yet, Gaara?" the blonde man asked. Gaara liked him the best – well, hated him the least. He didn't know if he liked anyone he had ever met, but this man was definitely better than everyone else he _had_ met. He had this nonjudgmental air around him, like his life's purpose was solely to listen to other people and not make any comments.

Once upon a time, Gaara might have chosen red, for blood.

There was no need to assert his existence down here, though. They already did it for him. Funny, that. They actually _wanted_ him around. Or, they were making sure he was still there, that he hadn't escaped, but at least they pretended to like him. Temari and Kankuro hadn't ever bothered to try.

Besides, red really clashed with the green and browns from outside, so Gaara settled for a goldenrod tint instead. Also, the goldenrod tint they had provided him with came with a wood-pattered theme, which was more interesting than the plain blank walls that the other colors had come with. It was actually fun, getting to choose something for himself. Gaara hadn't realized that making a choice about things as insignificant as wallpaper color could be so engaging.

"If you ever get bored, I found a few books for you, too. I'm sorry we didn't get any to you earlier. We didn't really know what you would like to read."

Gaara wordlessly took the proferred books. Among them were titles such as _The Tale of the Utterly Gutsy Shinobi_ , _The Rhyme of the Ancient Sage_ , _Beautiful Woodland Photography_ , and _Profiles in Love and Courage_. He had never heard of any of those books.

He went for the one with the sandcastles on the front first. _Sand Art._ It was a civilian book. Apparently, people could make beautiful sculptures and light table drawings with...sand. Gaara remembered playing in the sand once, making those things, when he was very small. But after killing people with his sand for so long, he had forgotten how.

Now he wanted to remember.

"I'll see you tomorrow, Gaara," said the man. "If you need anything else, let me know."

* * *

 _ANBU Maximum Security Containment Complex_

 _Row 8D_

"Well?" Ibiki asked. "Which wallpaper did he pick?"

"The forest, of course," Inoichi snorted. "I made sure all the other ones were as boring as hell. Look at this. Miles of sand, dry empty field, dry empty hill, and wall of mist. Of course he's going to pick the one thing that looks different. He might be psychologically damaged because of that faulty seal, but he's still capable of independent thought. Also, we may have layered those other ones with a mild, almost undetectable genjutsu that makes the viewer feel discomfort and annoyance, so that might have helped him make his decision, if only a little bit. You know, the standard old techniques."

"The power of suggestion? Excellent. I always start out with that one, just to make the perps more pliable."

"We're not interrogating him, Ibiki," Inoichi sighed.

"You're deliberately screwing with his head and brainwashing him into loving Konoha more than Suna, so I'd say it's close enough," Ibiki shrugged.

Inoichi rolled his eyes. "Although, I was surprised he didn't notice anything at first. It turns out, he was never properly trained in anything. Can you believe it? I mean, I understand why, since they were all afraid of getting killed, and his special abilities are unique, anyway – but still, isn't it insane? Everything he knows, he figured out by himself. He's an interesting brand of prodigy."

Ibiki walked over to the coffee machine and poured himself a cup. "Oh, really? And how exactly is the therapy holding up?"

Inoichi shrugged and shuffled through a few reports. "Very well. He's taken to sand sculpting and drawing. I gave him a few other books, too. A standard bullshit propaganda pamphlet about being a noble warrior and all that jazz; I forgot which one it was. And then a few Konoha classics, and a landscape photography collection of Hi no Kuni, and more stuff on Konoha, because 'Konoha is way better than Suna'. Plus one of Jiraiya's books, just for fun."

Ibiki nearly choked on his coffee. " _Jiraiya_ – "

"Not _Icha Icha_ , for god's sake!" Inoichi yelled. "The _other_ one! The non-perverted one!"

Ibiki smirked. "Laying it on thick, aren't you?"

"Oh, shut up. Whatever works, works, doesn't it?"

* * *

 _The Hokage's Office_

"I hear Naruto has been progressing well," said the Sandaime. "Is he ready for a non-combative B-rank outside the village?"

"Yeah. Trouble is, we're dealing with cream-of-the-crop S-rank missing-nin. He should be fine if I'm there, though," said Jiraiya, and Hiruzen let out a breath of relief. "He's been getting antsy lately, being cooped up in the village, and I'm sure the rest of Kakashi's brats would appreciate it greatly, too."

"Good," said the Sandaime. "This just came in from the Daimyo a few minutes ago. Some urgent 'paperwork' issue. Normally we think of Izumo Kamizuki and Kotetsu Hagane as jokes, but I think they were right in assigning these kids to the mission. I've already summoned them; they'll meet you at the front gates in an hour. They'll be running this mission themselves, for practice. Your job is to be their safety net, in case anything outside of parameters shows up. I don't think I have to remind you that this requires discretion."

Paperwork. The Daimyo had legions of accountants and secretaries to do his paperwork. He wouldn't waste money on shinobi for something as simple as this. Something requiring secrecy, then, and possible analytical skill. Officially, there were many other, more experienced teams that could deal with the Daimyo, but no one here was stupid enough to think Ino Yamanaka wasn't born to be a queen bee, or that Shikamaru Nara was not the most qualified. Especially not after that stunt he pulled with Itachi Uchiha, only a month after that Orochimaru incident.

Orochimaru, at least, they could pass off as Kakashi's doing. Itachi? No. Not when the only other adults in the area at the time were hospitalized for what was clearly injuries from Samehada.

Hiruzen wouldn't be surprised if the boy's face found its way into the Bingo Book soon. And he didn't mean it in a good way. He was twelve, and twelve-year-olds were not meant to have bounties on their heads. They were already drawing enough attention with Naruto.

"Is Kakashi coming?" Jiraiya asked.

"No," said the Sandaime. "It'll be hard enough for you babysitting three children without involving an infant as well."

Jiraiya snorted at the joke. "He won't be pleased to hear that."

"No he won't. Luckily, I have a plan to keep him busy, now that he's returned to mostly full chakra control. Konoha needs her soldiers back out in the field as soon as possible," the Sandaime said. "If Kakashi cannot fight, then he should at least be able to run. The bounty on his head isn't going to go away."

Jiraiya stopped writing and looked up. "That's Tsunade's problem; I can't help him anymore."

"Oh," the Sandaime whispered, pulling an oddly-shaped kunai out from his desk drawer, "oh, I think you _can_. Especially since Tsunade informed me that hand seals are not necessary when it comes to setting fuinjutsu."

Jiraiya stuttered in recognition. "What – sensei, that's insane. It's been over a decade and even I haven't figured it out – "

"As far as I'm aware, you took one look, saw all the math involved, and gave up." The Sandaime set it on his desk and waved his hand in dismissal. "Make it happen, Jiraiya."

"…And what if it _doesn't_?" Jiraiya asked.

The Sandaime shrugged. "Then we'll have something to keep him busy for the next few years, probably. But that won't be an issue, because I am certain he'll find a way."

"How are you so sure?"

"For the same reason Inoichi Yamanaka will succeed with Gaara. Because desperation makes for a wonderful teacher, and man can accomplish great things when there are no other options. You can afford to survive without it, but I guarantee you Kakashi will dedicate his life to learning this technique if it means being allowed back onto the field again."

There was nothing more damaging to a ninja's psyche, especially the ones with reputations, than the thought that one was just a piece of dead weight. It wasn't at all because of ego – ego got you killed, and Kakashi was a survivor if anything – it was because of the constant compulsion to matter. They were all born to be shinobi in Konoha, and for many, they hadn't had a choice. The life of the bloody kunai was all they _could_ do.

"I…suppose…"

"And, more importantly – " here the Sandaime smirked – "for all his moronic incapability to be in the barest possession of common sense at the best of times, there's no denying he's better at math than you."

Jiraiya winced. "Wow, sensei. Harsh."

Hiruzen Sarutobi laughed.

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

Honestly, the way people walked on eggshells around me, you'd think I was in an insane asylum. Out of the "three days" I was supposed to get, I only spent eleven seconds. No lasting physical or mental (I think) damage. And yet my father forbade me from practicing our shadow technique, even though I was arguably more equipped to deal with the feeling of fake-suffocation.

At least, when it came to Kakashi-sensei, his particular method of protecting me was to push me extra hard in his classic the-more-you-sweat-the-less-you-bleed logic. According to Ino this was because he was incapable of formulating proper emotional displays.

At least now we were leaving to Tanyu, finally.

I was quite surprised – and suitably impressed – at how quickly Izumo managed to push this through. He must have rushed it right over to the Hokage the moment the mission scroll arrived on his desk. Many people seemed to forget that desk chunin were still _chunin_. If he could fight and train as efficiently as he worked then he would definitely be ready for a rank promotion.

"Drink some water before you leave," said my mother. I took the offered glass and forced down the liquid. It ran down my esophagus like it was supposed to. _Don't think about that._

"You're taking this very logically," said my mother. It did not sound like a compliment.

"Why wouldn't I? Logic was what saved me. If I _hadn't_ snapped out of it, I would have never figured out how to escape early, and then you'd _really_ be dealing with a mess," I argued.

"It's nothing," she said quietly. "I only expected…more of a reaction from you. I can't remember the last time I ever saw you react to…anything."

"What are you talking about?" I asked. "I'm happy when I see the people I care about succeed; I feel sad when something goes wrong; I get angry when I see something unfair. You see my facial expressions every day. You even tease me about my 'thinking face' sometimes."

"It's not what I…forget it. If you really aren't troubled by 'just a little bit of waterboarding' then it hardly matters."

"Look," I said, "I won't admit it wasn't bad, because it was. And I was scared as hell. But in real life, I know how to swim. I can water-walk. I've messed around with a few water jutsu in the past, too, so I won't ever drown unless I run out of chakra, and if I did then I'd be dead anyway. In fact, I walked out of it less scared of drowning than before, so it all worked out."

She crossed her arms. "You expect me to believe that, Shikamaru?"

"What?"

"I saw you flinch before you stepped into the shower – "

"That was one time, and it was cold."

"Shikamaru."

"Fine. So sometimes I get minor…but they're very fleeting, and I always remember afterwards how I conquered it!" Honestly. I was the one being tortured, not them. I didn't see what the fuss was all about. "Everyone's working themselves up getting so worried about me, when all I really want is to not let anything unhealthy hold me back."

My mother was quiet for a very long time. Finally, she said, "I suppose I should have expected this, coming from you. Even as a child, you were always very self-reliant. Fiercely independent, I should say. And while that makes me glad, to see you standing strong, it also makes me feel very…distant. I _want_ to understand how you feel, Shikamaru. I _want_ to know what you've been through. I can't do that if you don't let me."

I wanted to tell her that no, she really didn't, but I knew better than to contradict my own mother.

"I get to see things like your Genin promotions, and your team training," she continued. "Little things, for the photo albums. But what about the important things, like this? You brush it off, like it's hardly worth my time. And while I understand you don't want to burden the people around you with things that you're capable of dealing with yourself…I just wish we'd talk more often. It's like you live in your own little world, cordoned off from the rest of us with a brick wall."

I didn't know what to say to that, so I said my goodbyes, informed her that the mission wasn't scheduled to take longer than a month, and headed over to Konoha's private directories to meet up with Ino and Naruto.

Legally, the building designs of the Daimyo's palace were supposed to be a secret to everyone except the Daimyo himself for security reasons, but of course that was never the case in real life. The builders, the engineers, the servants, the guards, the _shinobi_ – the Daimyo was probably the one _least_ knowledgeable about his own home. A man of his standing could hardly be expected to crawl around looking for secret passages, after all.

Konoha itself kept a constantly updated set of blueprints of the Daimyo's home. Every time a mission that took place within the Daimyo's palace was assigned, the participating shinobi would be responsible for updating the files. This was not a problem for me. Between Naruto's clones, and Ino's mind jutsu, we could easily cover this ground in a very short period of time.

"Here they are," Ino said, pulling out a thick folder. We opened it and peered inside. No doubt about it – these were the living quarters of a Daimyo. Everything, from the inside out, was designed for security – from the positioning of the guard posts, to the outward-curving roof ledges, to the composition of the walls themselves – was meant to make life as difficult for all intruders as possible.

Our mission was simple enough on paper. The Daimyo simply required assistance doing some cleaning and paperwork.

That could only mean there was trouble brewing in the court of Hi no Kuni. The Daimyo had legions of pages and servants to do his chores. The only reason why he'd be asking the shinobi of Konoha to do such trivial tasks was if he didn't trust his staff to do the same. It could range from either something as simple as a money launderer within his treasury to something as serious as a traitor shaking up the standard chain of command.

This was going to be pretty damn fun.

"This isn't just a standard investigation. It'll also be infiltration. Whatever the Daimyo is doing, he can't let the rest of his court know that he's on to them – hence the reason why he's disguised his mission as something this innocuous," I explained. "It would work out best in our favor if we didn't obviously show that we were shinobi – otherwise, whoever's causing trouble would be careful not to leave trails that we might find."

"Are we going to be using disguises?" Naruto asked. "Because I've got a bunch of awesome – "

"Plastic moustaches and rainbow clown wigs don't count, Naruto," Ino said.

"We'll figure out the specifics once we get there," I interrupted. "For now, let's just get ourselves informed about the inner workings of Tanyu and the Daimyo's court." We had been trained on specific behavior patterns and mannerisms of civilians, servants, and nobles alike while back in the Academy, but chances were command central would be sending someone to check up on us before the end of the week, just to make sure we were up to speed.

"Doesn't he have his own army, though?" Naruto scratched his head. "I thought that people don't like shinobi there. Why would he trust us?"

"We have a good working relationship with our Daimyo. He doesn't trust shinobi, but as such a high-ranking warlord, he'd be stupid to trust anyone else, either. What he does trust Konoha to do is to complete the mission and earn our pay. In other words, he is counting on us to be dishonest – since we're supposed to be dishonest anyway. Right now, he's more worried about the 'honest' people in his court, since you can't tell when they won't be."

"Plus, Konoha has this pact with the Daimyo. We're an autonomous village, but we can't accept any missions that would harm him directly. In effect, we can only work with him, and not against him – meaning that we're a good deterrent against his enemies, since he can hire us to get rid of them, but not the other way around," Ino explained.

"But what's stopping us from taking those missions, if we wanted to?" Naruto asked.

"Betraying him, you mean?" I said. "Well – nothing, really. But it's not really in our best interests to start a war with our own Daimyo when there's always so many other problems already present."

* * *

 _Jiraiya's House_

"You called?" Kakashi asked, sliding into the room where Jiraiya was packing his things.

Jiraiya blinked. Once. Twice.

"…No I didn't." Well, he was _going_ to, but Kakashi couldn't possibly have known that. What's more, none of this changed the fact that Kakashi Hatake was, for once, early – and obscenely so. Jiraiya took a moment to wrap his head around the possibility that the world might have imploded, and then leaned back in his chair and let out a long sigh.

"I heard Team 7 is about to leave on a mission to Tanyu, and I'm not invited. Is that true?" Kakashi plowed on.

"Hokage's orders," Jiraiya grunted. He threw a spare peasant's costume into his pack and meandered over to his desk. _Now where did I put that portfolio?_ "If you want to see Naruto he finished packing a few minutes ago. He went with Shikamaru and Ino to the map room. We'll all be meeting at the front gate."

Kakashi pouted. "But I'll be so _alone_."

Jiraiya did not fall for it. He wasn't as oblivious he often pretended to be. Beneath that calm exterior was someone who had spent the past few weeks doing nothing but beating himself up over something that wasn't his fault and scheming how to exact extremely painful and disproportionate revenge on two men far out of his reach.

As the kid normally did when things didn't go his way, the brat. He had a more delicate brain than he let on. Torture him for months and he wouldn't break, but go for his soul and he'd completely shrivel up like a raisin in the sun.

Jiraiya snorted. "Don't you have those little voices in your head to keep you company?"

"That's the Sandaime, not me."

That sent a frown onto Jiraiya's face. "How long has he been acting like that, anyway?"

Kakashi shrugged. "I have no idea. He never does it in public. I only know about it because he likes to single me out for private lectures – "

" – what a surprise – "

" – and sometimes he starts mumbling to himself after I leave. I didn't think too much of it at first, since lots of people mumble when they're working something out, but it's not every day you hear a guy arguing with himself."

That was a little worrisome, but psychology wasn't really Jiraiya's specialty, and he wasn't sure if this was something he should go around blabbing about. Their political situation with all the other Hidden Villages was already quite delicate; Konoha could not show even the slightest bit of weakness, or they'd be done for.

As long as the Sandaime Hokage did his job and did it well, who cared what happened behind the scenes?

"The answer is no," Jiraiya automatically responded as Kakashi opened his mouth again.

"You didn't even hear my question yet. I was going to ask if I _wasn't_ going, and by rule of double negatives – "

"Kakashi, shut up. You're not going, and that is final," Jiraiya said bluntly. "And don't you dare throw a fit in front of me. You want to raise a stink, go to the Sandaime."

"Naruto's going. The people after him are worse than the people after me," Kakashi pointed out.

"Naruto can turn everything within ten meters of him to ash in the blink of an eye, and that's just releasing the first tail," Jiraiya snapped. _Ah. There it is._

To the untrained eye, Jiraiya was simply holding a bundle of dog-eared papers. To the trained eye, it was still a bundle of dog-eared papers.

Kakashi shrunk as if slapped. "So you're calling me more useless than a Genin."

"If that Genin is Naruto Uzumaki, then yes, you are," Jiraiya said, even though that wasn't strictly true. Kakashi was still plenty dangerous. Just no longer as dangerous as some of the men who wanted his head. Hence the reason why Kakashi was being guarded like a useless civilian noble even though he was a Jonin who could easily take down the average hunter-nin. "But you won't be."

And he chucked the pile of tree pulp at Kakashi's head.

Kakashi caught it between his hands, got a glimpse of the front, and froze.

It was not the notebook itself that was special, of course – it was the information contained inside. An effective, chakra-efficient technique that did not rely on hand seals, perfectly suited for someone with low chakra reserves and a fighting style that relied on speed rather than strength. On the cover, ink faded with time, one could still make out the graying words designating the two men to whom those ideas belonged.

One name, written in spidery, but regal script –

 _Property of Tobirama Senju_

(And underneath it, the second name, in neat, rounded print – )

 _(Modifications by Minato Namikaze)_

* * *

 **A/N: Okay, how many of you were already expecting that? (I imagine quite a few. It's alright; you're allowed to brag.)**


	32. A Hollow Wooden Horse

BONUS #27: Sealing Languages

fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/155028657/1/Bonus-27-Sealing-Languages#155028657

* * *

 _Jiraiya's House_

Kakashi's face looked like a cross between a kicked puppy and a stranded fish. It was too much for Jiraiya, who burst out into hysterical guffaws.

"Is this…is this the Hiraishin no Jutsu?" Kakashi whispered.

Jiraiya was bent over, wheezing.

" _You_ had it this entire time?"

Jiraiya nodded, still laughing.

Fine, so perhaps Jiraiya should have given it to him sooner instead of waiting for the Saindaime to remind him about it. But he couldn't have let Kakashi get his hands on it right after Minato died. Jiraiya wasn't _that_ irresponsible. Letting an emotionally compromised teenager with a chakra-parasite eye attempt dimensional jumps was just asking for trouble.

And then Jiraiya's world travels happened, and Orochimaru happened, and Akatsuki happened, and he was _busy_ , okay?

Whatever. Seeing Kakashi shocked into speechlessness was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, and all of the stalling had been _so_ worth it.

Kakashi gently hugged the package to his chest like it was going to fall apart if he even jostled it a tiny bit. Which was, to be fair, true. To call it unwieldy was an understatement – a chaotic conglomerate of faded parchment held together with hope and prayer was a better description. Jiraiya himself had dropped it multiple times, and he'dd given up on putting it back together long ago, having opted for cramming the pages back in any haphazard order he could manage and keeping it in one relative mass with various combinations of tape and string.

He didn't think Tobirama had ever learned to number his pages, and he was pretty sure that Minato, for all of his organizational prowness, hadn't, either.

If there was anyone who deserved the arduous task of putting the thing back together in the right order, it was Kakashi.

The really funny thing was watching him revere a dog-eared bundle of papers more than he respected most people on the planet. "You should see your _face_!" Jiraiya gasped.

"Oh, yeah?" Kakashi retorted, never one to be the butt of a joke for long. "If you've had it for all this time, how come I've never heard any stories of a teleporting Sannin?"

Jiraiya shut his mouth petulantly. "I'd like to see _you_ decipher something that isn't even in the standard script."

That had been the genius of the Yondaime. He'd invented his own goddamn custom _sealing language_ from scratch for the _sole purpose_ of improving one of the Nidaime's curiosities.

Because that was what the Hiraishin originally was. A barely functional _curiosity_. Tobirama's experiment in a fuinjutsu-based equivalent to the Shunshin. That was the version the Hokage guard platoon learned, and since it was slower and clunkier and more complicated than even Kawarimi, it was simply regarded at yet another theoretical exercise in fuinjutsu application rather than a useful technique.

"Like what?" Kakashi asked, crossing his arms.

But Minato had recognized its potential, dubbed the Uzushiogakure standard script as completely useless for these purposes (even though it had been created by the greatest sealing masters of history and worked perfectly well for basically every other application for centuries, the arrogant little shite), and invented an entirely new, perfectly self-contained, system of sealing. All of that, to improve the speed and efficiency of ONE technique.

And then he up and _died_ without teaching anyone what exactly he meant by all his numerical mumbo-jumbo.

Except for maybe one person.

"Like those rows of numbers and letters that don't even have any operations. They're not even labeled. What purpose do they even serve, huh?" Jiraiya asked, pointing to a random page.

Kakashi lifted an eyebrow, and then, two seconds later, answered, "That's just him being too lazy to write down a hundred different variables for five different dimensions twenty times."

Jiraiya threw a scroll at Kakashi's smug little face.

"Get out, smartass."

Kakashi ducked the flying scroll, and his grin sobered when he glanced a second time at Minato's masterpiece. "When are you going to tell him?" he asked.

Oh, gods, this again. "That's your job. You're his sensei, and he was yours," Jiraiya said, staring pointedly at the secret code to the Hiraishin.

"You're his godfather," Kakashi shot back.

Jiraiya buried his face in his hands. "Oh, don't remind me…"

"You should tell him," Kakashi repeated.

"And what exactly _do_ I tell him?" Jiraiya hissed. "'Hey Naruto, you remember those years you spent alone with a crappy childhood? That could have been avoided if I decided to man up and take care of you like I was supposed to instead of gallivanting across the world, boozing and whoring! But that didn't happen, because I was selfish and irresponsible enough to think my own pain was greater than yours, the legacy of my student and Konoha's greatest hero, which we all left to trample in the dirt!"

Kakashi shrugged. "That sounds about right."

Jiraiya looked down and fiddled with the clasps on his pack. "I'll tell him everything when he masters the ninth tail," Jiraiya promised.

Kakashi looked out the window. "That might be sooner than you think."

* * *

 _The Front Gate_

For once, it was Kakashi-sensei who was waiting for us, rather than the other way around – most likely because this was a meeting he _hadn't_ been invited to, and thus had no personal obligation to waste anyone else's time.

Though I was excited to be leading my first mission, doubly so since we were returning to Tanyu to meet the Daimyo in person, I was also extremely nervous.

I wished Kakashi-sensei could come with us. I had nothing against Jiraiya; he _was_ a Sannin, after all, and I trusted Naruto's judgment of his character. But I had gotten used to my old team.

As a Chunin in all but name, I knew that I supposed to be adaptable, able to work with teams of strangers chosen for a skill set pertaining to the mission rather than personality. One couldn't expect to remain in the comfort zone of familiar classmates forever, after all, not when life and death was so unpredictable. But most people were allowed several years of this peace before ranking up, and a part of me wanted to be like them – the average, the unsuspecting, and thus the blissfully ignorant and unworried.

Smart or stupid, we were all puppets on strings. And I wasn't sure if being knowledgeable enough to wantto change that was any better than being unaware of those chains. Was a simple bird in its nest unhappy, just because it neither had awareness nor interest in the philosophies of how it came to be, same as the subatomic particles in the ground and the stars in space? Was a mouse in its burrow not content, even if it had no control over its environment, only subject to the whims of Mother Nature on whether or not it should freeze or drown or starve?

They knew nothing else; that's why. A wild animal had no need for either books or the secrets of the universe. The majority of the world knew nothing except the desires right in front of their noses, completely unaware of all that occurred beneath their feet. You could not miss what you never had; you could not want what you never imagined.

"You sure you'll be okay without us, sensei?" Ino asked, half in jest, and half seriously.

"I'll be fine. Sort of," he admitted, and there did seem to be a new spark of hope in his eye that wasn't there before. "But – here. I got something for you three." He held out three packages, wrapped in plain brown paper, one for each of us.

"What's this, sensei?" I asked, grabbing one and feeling around the edges. "Seems like a book."

Naruto grinned. "It's not one of your perverted books, is it?"

Kakashi-sensei at least had the decency to look affronted at that accusation. "What? No! Why would I ever do something like that?"

We all gave him the look.

He rolled his eyes. "Well, if you're just going to be so ungrateful, then I'll take them back – "

"Nope, that's okay," Ino said quickly, and tore the paper off her package. Naruto and I did the same to ours, although it hadn't really been necessary, since we had all been given the same book anyway – and thank goodness it wasn't _Icha Icha_.

Names, faces, ranks, known jutsu and skills, village of affiliation or former village of affiliation if they were a missing-nin, villages issuing or accepting bounties, bounty value for dead or alive, flee on sight commands…

"Sensei," I asked, "is that a Bingo Book?"

"The latest updated version," he grinned. "I even got you guys each your own platinum limited-issue personalized copy."

That turned out to mean, he had simply written our names on the inside cover…in pencil. Not even something vaguely permanent. _Pencil_.

"Consider it a gift from me for surviving the Chunin exams on your first try as rookies."

Naruto, Ino, and I all bit back groans. That basically translated to, "memorize this thing by heart from cover to cover; I'll test you when you get back from your Tanyu mission" in Kakashese. Yamato had a mixed expression of pity and internalized glee hidden in the corners of his mouth, as if he had been forced to do something similar before and was now relieved that it was someone else instead of him this time around. I had seen the same grin on Naruto's face before, every time Kiba got into trouble for a prank in his place.

"Why is it so _thick_?" Ino asked. "I've seen my dad carry a few copies around before. They're not supposed to be this fat."

"That's because it's my personal compilation of all the other villages' Bingo Books," Kakashi-sensei explained. "It's important that you know who other villages are targeting or otherwise looking for on top of who we want targeted. I don't expect you three to go around claiming bounties anytime soon, but it's always good to be aware of dangerous foreign nin. I tried to organize them by bounty amount, because those are usually a good indicator of skill level, although sometimes I will switch them around if I disagree with common opinion – usually because the ninja with the smaller bounty is more dangerous in some other way. Anyway, the last few pages are an alphabetically ordered index, and the first few pages are a table of contents, so there isn't _as_ much as it looks."

For such a disorganized person, Kakashi-sensei could be really organized sometimes. I took a peek at the book again. Sure enough, there were marked colors at the top of every page, showing each village that listed a bounty for a particular ninja. Very powerful ninja were usually wanted by all other villages except their own. Very powerful missing-nin were wanted by all villages including their own.

Ino was not as impressed as I was. "Is this crayon?" she asked, pointing to the colored tabs.

"Perhaps."

"You're _twenty-six._ You live in a _ninja village_. Where did you even _get_ crayons?"

"Hey, who's this guy with the big-ass meat cleaver? He has a mask, too. Is he your secret cousin or something?" Naruto asked, pointing to a random page.

"That's Zabuza Momochi. The guy who killed Gato, and the reason why there's that mess in Wave, remember?" I said.

"Oh, yeah."

"And…I think that's it. I don't like long goodbyes. So – try your best, don't screw up, and hope you have better luck than me," Kakashi-sensei said. "Don't forget to brush your teeth. If something goes wrong just spam clones and run like a bat out of hell. And Jiraiya – "

"What, brat?"

"Make sure they don't die. That's important."

"Gee, _thanks_ , sensei," Naruto called after him.

 _"Since when could Naruto use sarcasm?"_ Ino mouthed to me.

 _"He's on a team with you, me, and Kakashi-sensei. He would have learned sooner or later,"_ I whispered back.

"I heard that!" Naruto yelled.

* * *

 _The Hyuga Clan Compound_

"Hinata."

Hinata winced and stared down at her knuckles, which were wrapped up in bandages. She knew what was coming. "Yes, Father." _Just apologize. Bow politely and agree with everything he says and maybe, just maybe, he'll dismiss you before he starts that lecture about being a disappointment to the clan again. First a weakling, and now a little barbarian who would rather use her knuckles like an Inuzuka than a proper Hyuga –_

"…Nonetheless, strength is strength, and I am not so unjust to overlook it when I see it."

… _On the other hand, do I have to?_

Hinata gulped. She didn't quite remember what happened to the little tree, but it was gone now – and her father seemed more interested in how she demolished the tree (had she really done that?) rather than the property damage associated with it. Then again, it had been a stunted little thing, anyway, and Hiashi Hyuga had probably been wanting to get rid of it for ages.

"I want you to spar Hanabi again. Do not hold back."

 _Oh, no. No no no no. If I lose – but if I win, then Hanabi will definitely get the seal –_

Hinata stared back out the window to where the servants in the clan were digging up what remained of the destroyed tree to cart away.

 _Not Hanabi. No._

 _Oh, I am_ so _dead._

* * *

 _Konoha – Somewhere_

"Fancy meeting you here," the Sandaime said. "I haven't seen you out in the sunlight in quite some time." Then, he paused, considered their surroundings – an underground bunker guarded on all sides by various ANBU operatives of questionable loyalty – and had himself a good chuckle at the irony.

Danzo Shimura looked around at the barren concrete walls. "Well, what can I say. Sometimes I like a change of scenery."

The two of them shared a quick smile. The Sandaime knew they were just that – smiles, and nothing more. But Hiruzen Sarutobi longed for the days when friendship was still good and true, when the two of them could legitimately tell each other jokes without having them carry any meaning any subtler than expressing a sense of humor.

This wasn't supposed to be his job, damn it. They were supposed to be on the Fourth Hokage, not the Third. The persona of the Sandaime Hokage had been supposed to die when he had nominated the Yondaime Hokage. If only that noble idiot hadn't gone and gotten himself killed. Things might have turned out so differently then.

Hiruzen Sarutobi should have died the night of the Kyuubi attack, and would have, had he been fast enough. He would have gladly given up his own, aging self to keep the village prosperous. There was no use crying over spilled milk, but the regret would always be there.

They should have had Minato Namikaze. Instead, there was him, and Danzo, two old men long past their primes.

Minato Namikaze had been a very special man to him. Not because he had been the Yellow Flash. Not because he had been a sealing expert. Not because he had been an amazing fighter. But because he had been a man capable of surviving the viper's nest that surrounded every position of power, _without_ having to fake kindness. He could cry at the funeral of a man he had murdered in cold blood and no one would doubt his sincerity, not even a little.

No, every bit of his love and happiness had been completely real, even when surrounded by traitors on all four sides, and for all of his life Hiruzen Sarutobi never figured out how he managed to do it.

"Please," Danzo said. "Sit." He gestured to the lone set of furniture in the room – a pair of rickety wooden stools around an equally rickety table. "I apologize I don't have better accomodations for you. I know it doesn't look like much, but they were carved from one of the Shodaime's trees, and hold great sentimental value to me. I hope their interesting history makes up for their lack of comfort."

"Ah, well, thank you. How interesting indeed," the Sandaime returned.

"Of course, when I say 'interesting history', I meant this was the attempt at a wooden horse from two Genin drunk off stolen cooking wine," Danzo added. "See, the two chairs were supposed to be the legs, and we were planning to attach it later – "

"Oh, gods above," Hiruzen sighed. "The body wouldn't stand up straight so it just ended up looking like a sideways crab – "

" – Tobirama was furious that we had destroyed one of his brother's trees, but Hashirama was laughing his ass off – "

"That's not even a table; you've just turned it upside down and seated it upon its tail and unfinished head!"

Danzo shrugged. "Waste not, want not?"

Hiruzen sunk into the "chair" and tried not to laugh. Every single goddamn time he went to talk to Danzo, this _always happened_. If he had been any stupider, he would have forgotten the fact that Danzo Shimura was responsible for the forced indoctrination of who knew how many children.

Oh, but that was "completely fine", because he hadn't kidnapped a single child for years (what a thing to be proud of), on the account that the ranks of ROOT were already full enough, and all those forsaken orphans were already grown up and beyond help by now.

 _The Village_ this, _The Village_ that. All in a days' work for Danzo Don't-Worry-Hiruzen-I'll-Gladly-Sacrifice-My-Own-Dignity-for-the-Village-So-You-Don't-Have-To-Because-I'm-Just-That-Nice Shimura. And now he was pouring him tea and apologizing over the lack of proper carpeting. "Would you like any sugar?"

The Sandaime pursed his lips. "No, thank you."

"Good, because I actually don't have any."

"You know I dislike sugar."

"I have saltine crackers, if you would prefer that to tea biscuits. You can dip it in the brew and call it soup; I wouldn't mind." He looked down at the poorly-made tea self-deprecatingly. "Probably no difference anyway."

The scariest part? He wasn't acting. Danzo Shimura was a genuinely…not _nice_ , because he wasn't _nice_ …but he _was_ a distinctly well-mannered person. Reminiscent of the Fourth Hokage, almost, except Minato Namikaze hadn't kidnapped children. He had, however, been directly responsible for more deaths in one battle than Danzo in his whole life.

(Indirect, of course, Danzo still took the lead, by far.)

Well, he wasn't going to get anywhere, comparing Danzo Shimura to the Fourth Hokage. Minato legitimately despised war and regretted every single kill he made. Danzo, on the other hand, wasn't averse to war if it helped him achieve his goals. Being _polite_ and being _kind_ were two completely unrelated things.

They sat there in silence for a moment longer, before the Sandaime spoke again, absolutely determined not to let himself get distracted. Danzo had invited him here; he was going to make the most of it. "If this is about your little spat with Shikaku Nara again, I'm leaving."

"Oh, no, no," Danzo said. "Shikaku Nara? Why would I ever concern myself with him?"

Lie. Blatant lie.

Danzo hadn't spent the past several years hiding underground, surrounded by his bodyguards, completely inaccessible to the rest of the world, for no reason. It wasn't hard to guess the source of their enmity – ROOT, child prodigies, and the unholy product of Shikaku's marriage to Yoshino only added up to one thing − but _exactly_ what had gone down during that conflict was a mystery even to him.

It seemed the two of them were determined to keep their private war private, something the Hokage was eternally grateful for. No need to drag the rest of Konoha into their mess.

The first option would be that they danced around each other forever. Sadly, the second, more likely, outcome dictated that one of them would have to go eventually, offed by the other.

It wouldn't happen for a long time. On Danzo's end, even the Uchiha at the height of their power would be hard-pressed to find their way past his defenses and hiding-holes, let alone a tiny family like the Nara.

And on Shikaku Nara's end…well, the Hokage wasn't quite sure _what_ hewas doing to keep ROOT at bay, but seeing as he hadn't gone the way of the Uchiha yet, it was working.

 _Eventually, one of them is going to get the upper hand over the other,_ the Sandaime observed.

 _Over my dead body,_ Hiruzen retorted.

 _Exactly,_ said the Sandaime. _You realize we're the only thing keeping everything from going to hell, right? Shikaku hasn't directly tried to destroy Danzo yet because you protect him, and Danzo hasn't directly tried to destroy the Nara clan because he's afraid of pissing you off._

Neither of these options suited him very much. Despite everything, Konoha was his to protect, and to think that two fellow shinobi would turn against each other like this disgusted him. It was his duty to keep as many people as he could alive.

He hated being stuck in the middle like this.

"Look, I don't know what happened between you two, but don't try to bullshit me, Danzo. It obviously has something to do with his son – "

"…Oh, that? That was _years_ ago. A silly mistake on my part, I'll admit." Danzo shrugged. "The Yamanaka didn't say no. The Aburame, one of the noble clans, didn't say no. How was I supposed to know that Sleepy Shikaku was the only one among them who had any balls?" He took a sip of his tea, still smiling at his little joke. "Anyone would have come to the same erroneous conclusion. But I haven't tried anything since, so don't try to lecture me, Hiruzen. It's Shikaku- _dono_ who refuses to let it go."

"I wonder why," the Sandaime said sarcastically.

"I mean, all I did was somewhat forcefully offer to personally train his son; I don't see what the fuss is all about," Danzo said.

"Can you at least keep the collateral damage down to a minimum?" the Sandaime sighed, rolling his eyes. "Or do I have to remind you that Konoha comes before any of your private issues?"

All this hullaballoo over a mere child, really.

Eh, as long as they were both loyal to _him_ , and didn't burn down Konoha in the process, he didn't give a damn what either of them thought of each other.

Danzo shook his head. "Come now, Hiruzen. What do you take me for? I have my standards. The Uchiha were obviously guilty, and that was quite unfortunate, but I would _never_ kill a loyal, skilled, shinobi without reason. That would hurt Konoha, and we can hardly afford to lose any manpower, not with war looming over the horizon."

But if Danzo Shimura was Hokage, and Shikaku Nara opposed him, that would be considered insubordination and treason. Of course.

The Sandaime set his teacup down and sighed. "Look, is there a reason you wished to speak to me? I don't have time for your games."

"Maybe I just wanted to talk to an old friend."

The Sandaime snorted.

Danzo placed a hand over his heart. "What, you don't consider me a friend? I'm wounded. My whole life, I've spent cleaning up your messes for you – "

" – and I yours – " the Sandaime interjected.

" – we clean up each other's messes," Danzo amended. "Is that not what friends do?"

"Friends also get to the point, instead of wasting their friends' time."

"Killjoy." Danzo leaned in, and smiled again. "Fun fact, Hiruzen, I had never intended to try anything against your precious graduating class of clan heirs in the first place."

The Sandaime's grips on the armrests of his chair tightened. "You lie."

"I speak the truth. I had better things to do, than to chase after a bunch of children. Talented or not, they're already too old. Twelve and still Genin. Too many years wasted in the Academy."

"I would not call it _waste_ – "

" − Imagine my _surprise_ , when I was told _you_ had a hand in the massive Rookie turnout this year," Danzo plowed on smugly. "There was no purpose in you entering them into those exams, putting them into that maze with Orochimaru. You endangered all of their lives for _nothing_."

Surprise. What surprise? Danzo had known what he was implying when he had expressed interest in the training of that newest batch of Academy graduates. And when he didn't get his way, he had shrugged and took advantage of the situation to go off and do something else.

 _Now he's rubbing it in my face. He's already accomplished whatever he was planning while I was distracted by Orochimaru and Suna and now he's gloating in front of me._

The Hokage didn't know what to say to that, so he remained resolutely silen.

Danzo finished his tea and set the cup down. "Nice talking to you again, Hiruzen. I haven't had this much fun in years."

The Sandaime did nothing. Danzo took his moment of hesitation to stand up and leave. And he could only sit there, nursing his cooling tea and gouging imaginary holes in the Shodaime's table with his fingers.

"You're supposed to be retired," Hiruzen Sarutobi called after him.

"As are you, Hokage-sama," Danzo's voice floated down from the hallway. "As are you."

That, he couldn't argue with.

* * *

 **A/N: Even though they're both antagonists to Shikamaru, I see Danzo as a completely different flavor of person from Orochimaru or Akatsuki.**

 **What do you think of him?**


	33. The Gilded Coffin

BONUS #28

[wwwdot] fanfiction [dotnet] /forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/

* * *

 _Tanyu_

We made it to the capital of Hi no Kuni in a few hours, which was surprisingly much faster than I had expected considering how long we had taken last time. Then again, we had been traveling at the walking pace of an overweight civilian merchant all the way from Suna all those months ago. In the meantime, our running speed had increased exponentially since our Academy days, what with all that repeated exposure to Kakashi-sensei's ninken and Chunin Exam training.

When the grand walls of Tanyu were in our view, we stopped to change out of our shinobi gear into civilian clothes. Back when we were guarding the merchant, we had purposely left our uniforms on as a deterrent. We _wanted_ people to know we were trained shinobi, to deter any would-be thieves. But this time, our mission had called for discretion, and so we were simply another poor family looking for serving work instead.

The Daimyo's palace had been very easy to find. It was, after all, the largest, fanciest set of buildings in the city. Though, "set of buildings" was an understatement, because it was a city in and of itself – a massive compound composed of multiple sectors, and thoroughly self-contained. It even had its own set of walls, shelled inside the walls of Tanyu like an inner layer of an onion. There were farming villages I'd seen that were smaller than one of the royal apartments.

One of the Daimyo's bodyguards was standing at the front gate. I went up to him and showed him my forehead protector and the mission scroll, which I had kept hidden in my pockets up until now. The man seemed surprised, most likely at our age, but he didn't comment and let us pass.

There was a stout, middle-aged maid holding sets of palace uniforms waiting for us. "The Director said you were new," she said. "You must be very important servants indeed, if the Daimyo wants to meet you in person."

"Who are you?" Ino asked.

"Servants don't have names," she said. "But my friends call me the Butterfly."

She was not stunningly beautiful like the ladies of the court were expected to be, but when she smiled at us, her whole face lit up in a friendly glow, framed in gentle laughter lines.

But underneath her unassumingly plain features and her salt-and-pepper hair and the crow's feet around her bright eyes was a hint of something less innocent. Something neither malicious nor helpful, but with the potential to be both. Her motherly gaze was not one of unconditional love and devotion, but of the self-satisfaction coming from an iron-willed woman who knew things others did not. A gaze that promised things people didn't expect her to be capable of, because of how harmless she looked. I could see the hard wrinkles of a lifetime of labor in her hands that belied her frail frame.

 _She knows we are shinobi. She inferred it, simply from the knowledge that we were going to see the Daimyo directly. All because she was asked to deliver a set of uniforms._

"And are we 'friends'?" I asked carefully.

There was that smile again. "I wouldn't want to be enemies." There was a clatter of armor as a guard turned around the corner to escort us. She bowed quickly. "You ought to see to your duties." Then she turned and disappeared.

From the look on his face I could tell Jiraiya saw the same thing I did. He said nothing, however. Neither did Ino, who would have alerted me if "the" Butterfly had a shinobi's developed chakra system, or at least one honed through training, like Lee's. That woman was simply a scarily well-informed civilian.

Of course, I did not dismiss her because of that. Just because she was noncombatant didn't mean she was helpless. I was unsure if I could trust her, but at least I didn't want her as an enemy.

The Daimyo was already in his office when the guard showed us in. He looked up at the sound of the creaking double doors.

"Oh."

There were many types of "oh-s". This one was one of both surprise and disappointment.

"You're children," the Daimyo murmured.

Jiraiya said nothing. I was learning to lead a mission; making a good first impression was for me to handle. Luckily, I was used to being underestimated because of my age. No point in getting sent all the way out here, only to be sent back because our most important client didn't like how we looked.

"Pardon me, but is there a problem?" I asked neutrally. He could take that question however he wanted to. On my end, I wanted to be polite, but I couldn't let myself get stepped on. Court politics was, in some ways, just as brutal as shinobi politics. The only difference between us was that these men (and women) could not control chakra, which didn't matter because their pens and ink were just as deadly. After all, on average, more soldiers died in a single civilian battle than entire shinobi wars. And all because of some royal order. "Because if there is, I assure you, we are more than capable."

"No, no," the Daimyo said. He talked quickly and nervously. It was not the nervousness of hidden guilt, however; they were simply the random bursts of thought of a man generally frazzled on a regular basis. He was doing his best to hide it, as a high-ranking man of the noble courts always had to – like shinobi, he couldn't show weakness before his courtiers and subordinates – but I was used to deciphering much stonier people. "I know the Sandaime would not offend me with incapable soldiers. But you must understand…outside of the Hidden Villages…the rest of the world doesn't do this, not really…"

"Do what?" Naruto asked, scratching his head.

"You wouldn't understand because you grew up in a Hidden Village…Children who work deliver papers and wash dishes, that sort of thing…"

"So? Those sound exactly like D-ranks," Naruto muttered.

Ino elbowed him.

The Daimyo coughed. "Well, I suppose it doesn't matter. People don't ask questions of children. You would fit in well with the rest of the palace pages. Ahem. Forgive me, I was distracted. Dreadful business, it was…" he trailed off. "Well. One of my nephews – the son of my wife's second – or was it third? cousin – this morning – there was a suicide. And – hm – as you can see, I cannot have him disrespected or gossiped about. Things are already hard enough for us without the tabloids breathing down our necks…"

I nodded solemnly. "Of course."

It came to my attention that I was more unaware of the inner workings of the central court than I should have been, and painfully so. I had studied the various manners and customs of polite society, and the Daimyo's direct family tree, but everyone who was not on the line of succession, like this young nephew through marriage, was lost on me.

This would have to be rectified immediately. Which was harder than it sounded, because every large organization, from a hidden village to a great castle, had its own invisible pecking order. A social pyramid which one could only understand through direct participation.

The Daimyo rubbed his face. "This is a political nightmare. A member of my family suddenly dead; people would wonder why, and soon there would be rumors about something dishonorable. It was nothing of the sort, of course; he has always been beset with melancholy from a young age, and…well, I shouldn't gossip about the dead. Look at me, being distracted again. Look, I need workers around the palace and in the mailrooms to ensure no misinformation is spread."

I nodded. "I see. And are there any specifics on how you would like it done? We cannot hide the fact that there was a death, simply the manner in which it occurred."

The Daimyo looked as if he wished they could reverse death. An impossibility, I knew; death was easier than life, like entropy was easier than order. "I do not know much about how you work or what your special powers are like, and I do not _wish_ to know…" He coughed. "But, if you could…make it seem like he took ill? He had several fevers when he was young, and that is the least offensive way to die, apart from old age…"

"It depends. A healthy young man suddenly dying of illness would be suspect," I pointed out, politely, of course.

The Daimyo hemmed and hawed. "Ah, no, but his death is not widespread knowledge yet. So – "

"We could delay the funeral, I suppose," I said placatingly, not dismissing his idea just yet. It was not impossible. "We could spread the rumors over a longer period of time that he has taken ill with a contagious fever, and present the dead body later. More importantly, who knows the truth so far?"

He paused to think. "Apart from myself, my wife, and his parents – just his personal bodyguards, who found him. We didn't even call in any maids to clean up; we had the guards do that. Speaking of which, they should almost be done. I think I can trust those men; they have reliably worked for me and young Lord Isayama's mother for long before he was born. They knew his – personality. Sorry, Lord Isayama is the name of my nephew. I should have mentioned that before. But the guards, they would not lie…"

"I am certain your judgment is very sound, and your guards are trustworthy people. But I would like to be thorough, just in case. I would like to observe them first, if you don't mind."

The Daimyo rubbed his chin. "If that is what you think, then I will not interfere, although I really don't think that to be necessary at all – shouldn't you spend your time worrying about other sources of…gossip…"

"This will not take long, and besides, starting at the root is the best way to reduce the number of said sources," I said. "Did he do any important work? We'll have to keep the façade that some things are still running, if that's true."

The Daimyo stroked his beard. "I, ah, don't know what he did. But I'm sure it was important. You'll have to ask my Head Secretary."

"If that's all, then, we'll start with the guards cleaning the room. Afterwards, we'll tend to the mailroom and the servants' quarters."

The Daimyo turned to leave. "Excellent. I'll leave you to it. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have my wife to tend to. She is very despondent. Anything else you wish to speak to me about, you'll have to make an appointment with my Head Secretary. He knows that shinobi are here, though not what for. I trust the man, but you understand. Some things should stay within the family."

* * *

The guard sent to guide them, Captain Takeshi, grunted and moved without waiting for anyone to follow him. All of the corridors leading up to their destination were empty except for the odd guard. Evidently, the Daimyo was pretty serious in covering up this particular death. Like Shikamaru, Ino was curious, though in a different way.

For someone to be so burdened as to the point of taking his own life…Ino couldn't imagine how horrible his emotional state must have been. It was one thing to sacrifice oneself – to place the lives of others above one's own – but for a person to think himself so worthless that his mind, thoughts, and relationships didn't deserve to exist anymore?

Depression shouldn't have to work that way. People prone to depression could keep themselves stable with proper support. It hurt, to think that a man like him could have all the wealth in the world and still be poor. Was it isolation from having to keep face all the time? Pressure, from his station? Or could it be something more dangerous, like blackmail?

"It must be a dreadful loss. Was Lord Isayama well-liked?" Shikamaru asked carefully, as though he was wheedling something from the guard. The question itself seemed harmless, but still. There were some things Ino could just _tell_.

Captain Takeshi grunted again. "He wasn't well- _hated_. Kept his head down and his mouth shut, and too dumb and soft to cheat anyone, as far as I know. His favorite spot at any banquet was in a corner or behind a column."

 _Sounds lonely_ , Ino thought.

They came to a stop before a set of ornately carved double doors. From her memory of the maps and just the general décor of the place Ino knew these were the royal apartments. The living spaces were large and elegantly furnished, and everything inside just screamed of money. Ino knew she was well-off by Konoha standards, and this was just unnecessary, even for her.

Tanyu looked very different from the inside of an ivory tower, Ino decided.

But all the gold and jade and perfume in the world couldn't hide the smell of old blood.

As they neared the bathroom, the smell only got worse. She could only imagine what it must be like for Naruto, who had the best sense of smell among the three of them. Ino wanted to run outside and throw up.

But she didn't. Their skills were already being doubted here, and she didn't want to jeopardize their chances of completing this mission by seeming weak or queasy. This was, after all, Shikamaru's first time leading a mission, and she could tell it was very, very important to him. So, rather than running outside and throwing up like some newbie, she steeled her nerves and breathed through her sleeve instead.

All the pretty white marble tiling did little to improve the situation. Death was death was death, whether you were a poor farmer out in his rice paddies or the emperor of heaven.

A person, just like her – living, breathing, _thinking_ in one moment, and gone the next. As a Yamanaka, she had grown up learning that every mind, regardless of who it belonged to, was worth something. Out of the countless worlds in the universe and out of the trillions of possible human beings that _could have been_ ,the fact that one was ever born was a rare, special case.

Loss was always, always a waste. Out of respect for his life, if anything else, she would have to treat everything – nasty smell or not − seriously, not just some horror-movie object of disgust.

Their guard had a different opinion on that. He grunted in indignation. "They should have finished by now, by order of the Daimyo! Why does it seem like they've done nothing at all? You!" he barked at the lower-ranked soldiers standing outside the doors, and they jumped. "What are you doing, standing around like a bunch of ducks?"

"Keeping wandering eyes away, sir," the man stammered.

"And does it take twenty of you to barricade off one corridor? It smells like rotting corpse in here!" the captain roared. "Is this how you show your respect to a man you've served for so long – leaving his memory to fester – "

"They are here because I told them so."

Captain Takeshi choked on his own words and hastily bowed. "I apologize, Lady Arakawa. I did not know you were here."

Lady Arakawa looked every bit a highborn woman in her heavy makeup and expensive silks, her authoritative posture signaling that she was someone used to dishing out orders and having them obeyed. She turned to us. "I don't recall sending for any servants. Are you the shinobi my cousin's idiot husband hired? I asked for proper investigators, not…"

"I can assure you, my lady, we are more than capable," Shikamaru said shortly, "though we were told that we were here to cover up a suicide, not…"

Her mouth curved into an angry scowl, though she was clearly trying to use all her courtly manners to hide it. "Of course _he_ would tell you that. He wouldn't believe the truth even if it was dangled right before his face…"

"But it _was_ a suicide," Captain Takeshi protested. "He's tried this before, and there's even a note this time around. Let the poor boy rest in peace, and leave him out of your games – "

Lady Arakawa's glare could have withered a tree. "I did not give you permission to speak."

But Captain Takeshi would not be cowed. "I am a respected guard captain, not one of your maids! You may be nobility, but I answer to the Daimyo only – "

"If you had any respect for _my son_ , Captain, you would allow these shinobi to do their job!" Lady Arakawa snapped. "It was a murder, I know it! He wouldn't – he wouldn't – "

It was taking Ino every ounce of her self-control not to reach out to her. But given how pridefully Lady Arakawa acted before, Ino knew her sympathy might be taken for pity. Offending the mother of the victim was the last thing she wanted right now.

* * *

Naruto couldn't believe how much these guys spent on a simple _bathroom_. The faucets were all gold and everything. Which was pretty sad, because that didn't stop a guy from dying.

He felt very out of place, standing here. Even more so, because the rubber gloves and plastic bags over his sandals made him feel like a human penguin. He really wanted to scratch his head, too, but it was under a shower cap thing, and he'd have to go outside if he wanted to take it off. Shikamaru was nothing if not thorough. Something about not contaminating the crime scene. It was like they were in a detective story. Only real.

One thing the stories never mentioned was the icky smell.

There was a young man, sitting fully clothed inside a large marble bathtub. His fine robes were embroidered in intricate patterns bearing the fire symbol, not unlike the ones the Daimyo himself wore, though one could hardly tell because of the horrid stains. The rusty red-brown color was everywhere – in the water, on the sides of the tub, on his nice clothes…

A large, ugly gash had opened his left wrist right to the bone.

The knife responsible was in his other hand. So this was Lord Isayama. He looked like he was in his mid-twenties. Even for shinobi standards that was fairly young. Not as young as the kids who died in the Third War, but since then the life expectancy had gone up about a decade, which was pretty good, all things considering.

 _Not that it tells me much,_ Naruto thought. _Mid-twenties can mean anything. It spans such a wide range of maturity. Asuma-sensei, Kurenai-sensei, Gai-sensei, Kakashi-sensei, Yamato – heck, those two guys at the front gate that I would sometimes talk about pranks with, Izumo and Kotetsu – they're all separated by only two years._

That brought him to another point. _And what about us? Shikamaru, Ino, and me – we're the same age as that gang of morons – Ami or whatever – who used to pick on Sakura-chan all the time._

Naruto didn't get it at all. Maybe Ino would be able to explain it to him later. Lord Isayama was surrounded by so many nice things, but he wanted to die. Naruto had only recently escaped his childhood poverty, and yet he loved his life, both the good and the bad.

For a long time, Naruto could do nothing but stare at the cut. It ran across his wrist in a morbid smile. Now, Naruto was a shinobi, and he had gone hunting before, not to mention all those ANBU guys that fought Orochimaru, but it was still…sad.

He finally tore his eyes away from it, and tried to focus on anything else instead. He decided to tour the rest of the room instead, just like Ino, who was inspecting the note pinned to the faucet. Naruto looked carefully at the shelves, turned around the bottles along the mirror, peeked under the potted plant by the sink, and even sniffed the partially melted scented candles. Nothing too special there.

"Sad, isn't it?" Ino asked, passing him the note. It consisted of a short poem and a signature. Naruto wasn't much of a reader, let alone classic literature, so he didn't understand it much, but he nodded.

"It is," Shikamaru agreed absentmindedly, "very sad."

"For goodness' sake," Captain Takeshi interjected, having found his voice again. "I don't see what the point of this is. "

Lady Arakawa held up her hand and brought her fingers together in the universal sign for _shut up_. "Why don't you let _them_ do the thinking."

There was an uncomfortable silence, which was finally eased by Shikamaru, who had not moved from his spot on the floor. To the people who didn't know him, they might have thought he had been unaware of the squabbling, completely absorbed as he was in his investigations. Naruto knew better, though. Shikamaru was a master multitasker, and very good at pretending to ignore things he was actually paying close attention to besides.

"He was still alive when he entered the bath this morning, yes? How long did it take for you to find him?" Shikamaru asked, focus not breaking once.

"An hour, maybe less. We went to check on him when we noticed he had been inside for a long time. He normally only takes half that time. In at eight, out at eight-thirty. It wasn't nine o'clock yet when the guard came crashing into the Daimyo's office. I remember because the Daimyo had an appointment at nine, and the other guy wasn't there yet."

"And was the water running when you found him?"

It was Lady Arakawa who answered this time. "No. The bathtub was full, and his bloody wrist was submerged under the water."

"Hmmm…well, at least they knew not to pull the plug. You say he's tried this before?"

Takeshi glared at Lady Arakawa. "Yes. He has. Not in this way. Jumping, hanging…but we always found and stopped him before – before − "

"And now he's apparently succeeded."

"Are you going to sit there and ask obvious questions? He's dead and gone; there's nothing more we can do for him!" Captain Takeshi bellowed.

 _Grief. I detect grief._ That was the extent of his observational skill. Ino was a good teacher, but at this point Naruto could only pinpoint one emotion at a time. _Perhaps he was a close friend of the young nobleman. He wants to grieve and move on; instead, this woman decides to drag it out by hiring child soldiers and insulting him._

"Yes, it's all very convenient, isn't it?" Shikamaru asked. "Person with a history of suicide discovered dead in the washroom with a knife in his hand and a slit on his wrist." He stood up and wiped his hands. "We're done here."

"Thank you," Captain Takeshi snorted. " _Now_ can we – "

"No."

He gaped in shock. "Why _not_?"

"I don't know what killed him yet," said Shikamaru, "but I can tell you right away it wasn't the slit wrist."

Captain Takeshi was still fuming from his earlier exchange with Lady Arakawa. "And how would _you_ know? You looked at that for about two seconds!"

"I know it's very convenient. Person with a history of self-harm discovered in his bath with a slit wrist. But that's a very messy and painful way to die, and very rarely results in death. Even with warm water a cut going across the wrist would clot. It looks like there's a lot of blood because of the water in the tub, but trust me. There's nowhere near enough to be a cause of death." That was Shikamaru, all right. Precise and professional, as usual, he responded accordingly to the weight of the situation.

Naruto wasn't Ino, but he could tell the look on Lady Arakawa's face was obviously a smug _I told you so_. It was an angry, hollow satisfaction, Naruto thought. After seeing her son die the only joy she could find was reveling in being right while everyone else was wrong.

"…So what do we do now?" Naruto asked.

Shikamaru's eyes flashed. "Now isn't that the question of the day," he muttered. "We'll need to secure the perimeter. Jiraiya, if you please." After Jiraiya exited the chambers, Shikamaru returned to contemplating the bloody bathtub. "We'll have to request backup, too. We won't need them if this ends up being a suicide after all, but I'm not taking that chance with you guys here. If there is a killer, it's unlikely they'll stick around, but people get unpredictable once they realize someone is on their tail. A smart one would run; a confident one would return to finish the job."

Naruto's head spun at all the possibilities. "We can take them, can't we? And Jiraiya's here!"

"You can never be too safe," said Shikamaru. "Besides, what will happen after? The Daimyo will no doubt want a team to track down the killer for questioning, in case they were doing it on someone else's orders. But we're still an information security detail. No doubt this news will cause chaos."

Naruto's head spun.

Shikamaru was still giving out orders. "We should try to determine cause of death immediately. If it's a suicide, our original mission applies. If it's a murder, we'll still need to keep things private. We don't want gossiping strangers getting involved and sidetracking the investigation with unrelated information. At the very least we have a duty to stay here until our replacements arrive so we can brief them."

Naruto's head spun. And Shikamaru's face was blurry.

"Will they send us home, do you think?" Ino asked. Her head was a big yellow blob.

"They might. I hope not…though…we could have…useful…"

Naruto's ears pounded. His teammates' voices were getting lost as the cottony feel overtook his hearing and the air felt thicker than usual. He swayed.

" – Naruto! Are…okay?"

"…Outside…we need…"

Two sets of hands found him, and Naruto fell backwards. The ground floated away from him. He didn't know what was happening. Oh, soft carpet. Weird…things before his face. Fingers…what were they? Fingers?

"Answer…Naruto! Ans…me…"

The fox was swearing at him, but Naruto couldn't really understand him. Perhaps that was better for everyone because Naruto was having a hard enough time understanding the world without a second voice screaming inside his head.

"Pois…" he slurred.

Then his tongue quit on him. Naruto knew no more.

* * *

 **A/N: Some of the ages in** _ **Naruto**_ **really surprised me. According to the wikia, at this point in time, Izumo and Kotetsu are 25, Kakashi, Yamato, and Gai are 26, and Asuma and Kurenai are 27. Also unmentioned – Genma, Ebisu, Raidou, and the other side-character Jonin are older than the Jonin sensei (age 30+). Some of the proctors from the first phase of the Chunin exams in canon (those guys with clipboards) were also older than the four Jonin instructors.**

 **I know I introduced a few new characters in this chapter, so would it help you guys if I made a character chart? (Don't worry; I don't intend to introduce any more significant OCs beyond this Tanyu arc. There's only about 4 of them.)**


	34. Another Man Down

BONUS #29

forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/

* * *

 _Tanyu_

A million sparks of fear exploded through my brain when I saw Naruto collapse. Naruto was _Naruto_ ; he didn't randomly faint for no reason.

Poison. It sounded like such a normal word in the shinobi world, until you had it used against you. This was like the vapors from the Chunin exam, but worse, because at least then the proctors weren't trying to use anything deadly.

"Ino – " I choked.

"I got it," she whispered. Without prompting, she had already set up her vials of indicator. Her hands flew over the test tubes like lightning. In any other circumstance, that is, one where Naruto wasn't in trouble, I would have told her out loud how much her chemistry skills never ceased to amaze me. Outsiders who didn't know Team 7 very will generally considered her the most normal person of our group because she wasn't as combat-oriented as the rest of us, but this was one of quite a few categories which she consistently bested me in. And when I say "bested" I mean "left in the dust".

It was obvious that this was connected to the death, but I hardly cared about Lord Isayama, who wasn't going anywhere. In the back of my head, I knew that Naruto would probably be fine in about a few minutes thanks to his healing factor, and of course I trusted Ino's skills, but I still worried for him.

As Ino worked, I closed my eyes and searched through my memories, trying to remember as accurately as possible everything that had happened leading up to Naruto's collapse. Our last meal had been at home. We drank our own water, and I trusted that Naruto was smart enough not to let someone slip him something. Thus, it was not ingessted. We hadn't encountered any animals or insects; no reports of bites or stings or scratches on the way. Thus, he came into contact with the poison at the scene.

If he had inhaled something then we, as well as Lady Arakawa and the guards, would be feeling the effects as well. Unless this was one big conspiracy where everyone had the antidote but us. Could he have touched something? No, we were all wearing gloves. Unless it was his face. He could have touched something and then touched his face.

What did he touch? I was at the tub, Ino was at the faucet, and Naruto was standing by the mirror and shelves. He was looking at the soap and shampoo bottles. He had taken them off the shelves, and then put them back in their places. After that, he'd picked up the candles to get a closer look at the melted wax…

 _Right there. After he sniffed them, he wiped his nose. We were only minimally exposed because they've been unlit for a few hours, but Naruto touched the wax directly._

"It's the candles," Lady Arakawa said suddenly. "I am certain it's the candles!"

Although I was impressed with her unusually quick reasoning, I was also wary to act right away, fully aware that upset parents could accuse all sorts of people in their grief. "He could have contaminated his gloves with a number of things before he touched those candles…"

"No," she insisted. "I'm sure it's those candles. They were lit when we found him. I blew them out because I thought I might be able to use them to mark the time and turned on the vent because of the smell. At the time I thought nothing of it, but I know where those candles came from!" She paced angrily. "That old dog! That confounded Head Secretary!"

"What did he do?" I asked.

" _He_ gave me those candles. As a 'gift', just a few days ago. I hadn't had the chance to use them. I still have a few unwrapped ones in my bedroom, in their box," she explained. "My son asked if he could have one, and I gave it to him like a fool! He meant them for me, I know it! Isayama never hurt anyone in his life!"

"Thank you," I said.

"Well?" Lady Arakawa asked. "Aren't you going to arrest him?"

"First, we are going to make sure our teammate doesn't die. Then, we will test the candles and your son's blood to make sure that they indeed contain traces of the same poison to lend more credence to your story. And _then_ we can bring him in for questioning," I explained, ignoring Lady Arakawa's outraged look. "Then there's also the matter of who personally dirtied their hands for this, since Konoha's leaders answer directly to the Daimyo."

"You don't understand," she hissed. "The walls have ears, and none of them belong solely to the Daimyo. Only a fool would believe he's the most powerful man within these walls. He bows to the advisor who gives him the most convincing argument…and that person is usually the Head Secretary, who, coincidentally, also controls his daily schedule. Contrary to what the Daimyo told you, he knows exactly what happened and why you're here."

I had never met the Head Secretary, but if what she said was true, then we had a big problem. After all, we had to go through that man to get another appointment with the Daimyo.

I didn't doubt the true extent of his power. The Daimyo's weak and indecisive personality was notorious throughout Fire Country. He wasn't the reason for our currently stable state of trade and order. Still, I was determined to remain impartial. It was easy to fall into the trap of instinctively picking a side this early on – Lady Arakawa, after all, was on the victim's side, and everything she said so far made sense. "At least he's capable," I said, to gauge her reaction.

"Capable," she sniffed. "Capable men are everywhere. Trustworthy ones, however…" She shook her head. "We used to be friends, can you believe that?"

"Is that so?"

"Not close friends. Alliances are very temporary in this place. But I respected him. When my husband died and left us his properties he helped me fend off the liars and debtors that wanted a piece of it. Trust me, I wouldn't have accused him lightly. He's a ridiculously powerful man, but he's also done this country good. I had no quarrel against him."

I raised an eyebrow. "So why did you accuse him?"

She sunk into a chair and covered her face with her wide sleeves. "Recently, one of my allies informed me that he was conversing with some shinobi. At first I thought nothing of it. He was managing a whole country; of course he would have some dirty secrets. Everyone here does."

Well, of course. That was why I wanted this Tanyu mission, after all. A little bit of leverage was always a great way to find allies, and allies in a noble court was a useful thing indeed.

Lady Arakawa continued her story. "In Tanyu, we keep each other's secrets. That's how you know who your allies are. You agree not to talk about each other. So I decided to forget about it because he was, you know. A friend. And everyone cheats a little bit. I looked the other way, like I'm sure he does for me normally.

"Somehow he found out that I knew. When he confronted me about it, he was very angry and panicked. I assured him that I didn't understand it, and I promised I wouldn't tell anyone. He calmed down after that, and that's when he gave me a gift basket with the candles in it as an apology for losing his temper."

"You think the poison was meant for you," I concluded.

"What else could it be? I promise you, I would not dare to go up against a man like that if I had something left to lose. But my son is gone and he knows that his trick failed. He'll try something else soon enough. I thought he was my friend, but now it's a matter of survival for me!" she said. Her prior stony appearance was gone. "I must leave. Before he – "

"You are a member of the Daimyo's family, no matter how distant. If what you believe is true Konoha will offer you her services," I told her. "I can arrange for a guard detail. You will, of course, have to return for the day of the trial. Yes, there will be a trial. We cannot execute people based on finger-pointing alone, no matter how obvious the evidence seems."

A look of panic flashed across her face. "I think it would be safer if I left the country."

"I think it would be safer if you were accompanied by Konoha nin wherever you went," I told her, annoyed that she wasn't more grateful for my intervention. "If you fear that the Head Secretary has connections to Konoha, it would be in your best interest to put in an order for a mission as soon as possible. We do not fight our own, so should we receive your orders first we would not accept his."

"He could hire other shinobi – "

"From another village, or a rogue nin? It's one thing to outsource missions, it's another thing to allow foreign shinobi pass into Fire Country for the express purpose of attacking a citizen of Fire Country – that is, you, and the Konoha nin guarding you. In fact," I stressed, trying to discern why she was so adamant against the idea of being guarded by our ninja, "that is treason, and punishable by death. If he's as smart as you say he is, he wouldn't risk that."

The truth was, if he was as smart as she said he was, he'd find a way to circumvent paper trails. However, I was determined to keep track of Lady Arakawa. Too many times, key witnesses were sent into hiding only to disappear mysteriously.

Her shoulders slumped. "Very well. I accept your assistance."

At that moment, some shuffling came from the floor. "Owwww…" Naruto pushed himself to his elbows, groaning.

"Naruto," I breathed. "You okay?"

"Yep, I'm fine." He patted his stomach. "You know me. It could have been worse if it was either one of you."

Another stab of fear went through my brain. What if it had been Ino? Then we'd be down our poison specialist. And she didn't have Naruto's healing abilities. Though I was capable of holding my own against the more common toxins, there would be a point where all I could do was put a body in stasis and hope that a more experienced specialist was close enough.

"How many fingers am I holding up?" Ino asked.

"Three," Naruto said. "And don't you dare tell me your other hand is hiding one behind your back. Or that the thumb doesn't count."

"He's fine," Ino announced.

Lady Arakawa's painted eyebrows shot up to her hairline in shock. "How did you – " But she stopped herself halfway.

"What, the poison?" I asked.

"Nothing," she said. "Your friend, he looked so ill earlier; I thought – but I don't know anything about how shinobi or poisons work."

As I prepared an excuse that didn't involve Naruto's secret (which, while well-known in Konoha, had no business dancing around civilian circles), Ino shrugged and explained that this one had been relatively simple for her because it was a plant-based poison – concocted from from many flowers she commonly worked with. "I found the same poison in lethal concentrations in Lord Isayama's bloodstream and the candles. This was definitely the cause of death."

There was that triumphant look on Lady Arakawa's face again. _I told you, didn't I?_ But then she caught another glimpse of the corpse in the tub, and it all melted away to a blank sadness again, as if reminded that nothing was going to save him.

* * *

 _Konoha_

The Sandaime glared at the messenger hawk on his desk. The B-rank from the capital had turned into an A-rank, which no longer surprised him one bit. For one, court politics was always a disgusting mess even he didn't want to deal with, and for another, the Fire Daimyo was a damn fool. A good man, but an indecisive fool. His wife wasn't much better – she, too, was a silly, frivolous woman.

But what did that matter, if they were both alive while numerous others, too clever and ambitious for their own good, were dead? The Daimyo was no mastermind, but he understood loyalty and good business. As long as the country was prosperous, the true powers of the Land of Fire – that is, his board of advisors, whispering in his ear – could care less about his stupidity. Reveled in it, even, because that meant they had more freedom to do what they liked.

Thank the gods they'd sent Team 7 instead of the regular fare. His soldiers were all intelligent, and well-trained as actors and liars, but there were certain intricacies in that snakepit they called the noble court that required…something more.

Shikaku's son, who no doubt had already learned the rules within five minutes of receiving the mission statement, Inoichi's daughter, who had been born a queen bee since the day she set foot on her first playground, and Minato's son, who was apparently better at acting like a hotheaded moron than actually being one according to Yamato's reports.

 _I send him in there with a B-rank, and within a day he's already secured another B-rank and an A-rank. Either the kid's got a head for business, or just shit-awful luck._

Now, how to cover this up before Kakashi got wind of it…

"Sandaime-sama, did something happen?"

 _Speak of the devil and he shall appear._ "Kakashi, what are you doing here? Don't you have work to do?"

Kakashi stretched. "Oh, I thought I might take a break, so I stepped outside for some fresh air. It just so happened that I had the luck to step right into a cute old lady who…"

The Sandaime glared at him.

"…let's skip that part, and long story short, I heard my cute little students' B-rank turned into an A-rank. I expect you have an explanation, or at least a solution, in order?"

"Save your words for someone who deserves that punishment, Kakashi," the Sandaime shot back. Kakashi at least had the manners to look apologetic. "Your students are perfectly safe. Jiraiya is with them, and Shikamaru was intelligent enough to request a team for backup instead of trying to dive into things himself. He suggested Yamato and Anko, and I agree with his choices. Sad that it's not you, but we can't always get what we want."

Kakashi leaned against his desk. "And are they on their way home?"

"No – "

"Why not?"

"See for yourself. It was Shikamaru's decision. Someone had to stay on-site to brief the next group. Have a little faith in your own training regime, Kakashi."

Not that the situation needed explaining; Kakashi had already stolen his student's letter off the Hokage's desk, reading it with a greater intensity than the feigned disinterest he afforded his dirty novels. With every word, he could see the forced smile beneath his mask growing wider and wider. It was incredibly unnerving, to say the least.

" _'Putting this here because I know you're going to find out and probably blow up anyway, Kakashi-sensei, but there was a minor poisoning incident. It was nothing Ino or I couldn't handle and of course Naruto would have been okay even if we weren't there. Please don't get mad at Jiraiya; he was securing the perimeter.'_ Doesn't that sound great, Sandaime-sama?"

Hiruzen almost wished he had the pseudo-stoic thirteen-year-old Kakashi again. He'd been surprisingly easy to read back then compared to all the varying degrees of laziness and immaturity now. A mostly transparent mask was better than a thousand reflective ones, and a man who didn't show any emotion was infinitely less dangerous than a man who showed emotions that weren't his.

"They ran into an unexpected problem; they responded quickly and professionally and nothing bad happened. In fact, the incident helped them gain a great deal of intelligence about what they were facing."

Kakashi was still smiling. And pointedly staring at Hiruzen's forehead instead of his eyes. "No, no, that's perfectly reasonable. I expected no less from my amazingly talented students."

And he kept standing there, _staring_ , well past the socially acceptable time for someone to leave after the end of a conversation.

"No, Kakashi, you're not allowed on any missions until you finish your homework! Do I have to take away your desserts for the rest of the week, too?" the Sandaime snapped. "How did you find out so quickly, anyway? I just got that hawk half an hour ago."

Rather than answering, Kakashi blatantly rotated his perfectly positioned ashtray (one centimeter from the front and right edges of his desk, lined up at a perfect right angle to the corner) three degrees to the left _as if he wouldn't notice_. And then acted like it was an accident.

* * *

 _The Hyuga Clan Compound_

Hinata couldn't hide her shaking hands, or bring herself to meet Hanabi's eyes. Both actions did not go unnoticed by Hiashi Hyuga, she knew. The Byakugan didn't miss anything. As she was reminded day after day after day…

The clan's arrogance annoyed her very much, though she would never say it aloud, of course.

"This spar will last until one person loses. No mercy, no forfeiture, and _no holding back_." His glaring blank eyes were fixated upon her at that last phrase. "The first person to fall unconscious shall take the mark."

"Or die," one of the elders reminded him.

"Or die," Hiashi Hyuga agreed, after a millisecond of hesitation – which surprised Hinata, because a Hyuga was supposed to be decisive all the time and never be hesitant, _ever_. "But let us hope it does not come to that. Leave the murder of family members to foreign nin."

Out of the corner of her eyes, Hinata could see Neji tighten his fists. The whole clan was here, watching, and they knew the story of Neji's father just as well as she did. How could he say something like that? Did he have no respect whatsoever for Neji's feelings, just because he was a Branch Family member? She understood that sometimes pain and lies were necessary, to make someone stronger or keep them safe, but right now, she had no idea what purpose such a thoughtless statement would serve. It brought no one any benefit.

This was just the same as the last time she fought Hanabi. Hiashi Hyuga's disappointment of an older daughter, about to be the first member of the main branch in all of Hyuga clan history to forfeit her title as heir…

How was she suppoosed to do this? How was she supposed to strike down her wonderful, loving baby sister, the girl she'd promised she'd protect on her mother's deathbed? Someone would be walking out here a loser, and what sort of older sister would she be if she forced Hanabi to make that sacrifice in her stead? She might as well be shoving her own sister in front of a kunai meant for her, only people could recover from knife wounds given some time and luck, whereas the Caged Bird seal was forever.

This was what the Hyuga clan did to people. Pitting the old against the young, the strong against the weak, oppressing those without a voice and stamping out hopes and dreams before they could even be born.

This was why the clan was the way it was. Stagnant. Reliant on a single style of taijutsu, never even considering any other options, all because of the pride of one single clan head "said so". Never once thinking that maybe, just maybe, the Byakugan, which could see for kilometers, could be used for something other than close-range combat. That maybe, just maybe, someone who wasn't naturally talented at the Gentle Fist could be good at other things, too, if only allowed the chance to explore…

The Hyuga considered themselves the pride of Konoha, now that the Uchiha were nearly extinct. Hinata considered them a blemish instead. A badge of slavery and oppression that an otherwise proud and free village wore. And she knew Neji, and Hanabi, and every single Branch Family member, had all at one point in time harbored thse thoughts too.

She looked at Hanabi's bare forehead. One of them would be getting the curse seal today.

 _(remember the trees)_

− not quite. There was still one more person in the room with an unmarked face.

 _(the first person to fall unconscious…)_

She would not shame herself. She would not forget who she was. She was not going to lie any longer. She would not suffer this injustice and cruelty in silence.

Subconsciously she began packing her fists full off chakra.

 _(this is for you, Hanabi)_

Hiashi Hyuga's condescending face caving in beneath her knuckles was probably the most satisfying thing she'd ever felt, until she kicked the compound gate into splinters and stalked out completely unopposed thirty seconds later.

* * *

 _Tanyu_

The backup teams Shikamaru requested made good time. Yamato's team quickly ushered Lady Arakawa away, while Anko's group split up. Two of them – a Hyuga branch member and a clanless Jonin − went to take the Head Secretary into custody, while she and a Jonin from the Inuzuka clan stayed with them.

Ino was looking forward to working with Anko. She was weird, but no one could deny she knew her way around poisons, especially since she'd trained directly under Orochimaru.

Very conveniently, before her departure, Lady Arakawa had thought ahead to call upon several servants who could corroborate her story on her argument with the Head Secretary. They directed Ino to the gift basket in question swiftly.

It was a giant pink monstrosity filled to the brim with expensive soaps, shampoos, random candy assortments, and the candles in question sitting in a partially opened box. There were five of them, with an empty spot for the sixth, the one Lord Isayama had presumably taken.

All of them tested positive for the poison. As well as everything else in the basket.

"Well," said Anko, observing the used and unused candles side-by-side in the burn testing chamber, "the height certainly seems to indicate that it was burning for about an hour. Assuming Lady Arakawa was in the right state of mind to remember things properly – he borrowed one of these from her, lit the candle, and then tried to kill himself, although it's clear he didn't know where his arteries were. He unwittingly got what he set out to accomplish, though he probably could have been saved if the candle hadn't been there."

"None of the recent scents point to any outsiders. I only found Lady Arakawa, the guards, Lord Isayama, and us," said the Inuzuka. "Plus some faint smells of servants. But it could have been anyone. They could have been bribed to mess around with those candles, not knowing what any of it was."

"It could be a murder dressed up as a suicide," Ino suggested. "As in, the candles were there to kill all along. They knocked out Naruto really quickly, so it would be easy enough to put the cuts there after. They just didn't anticipate that we'd figure it out, and with all the guards everywhere they had no opportunity to go back in there and seize the candles."

"Could be," said Shikamaru. "Only one way to know for sure. We have to interrogate the Head Secretary and search his quarters. I can't wait to see how the Daimyo will react to this."

Hilariously, Ino was sure. She could just imagine the Daimyo crying for his bodyguards to protect him and fainting from the excitement in the process. In any event, she was looking forward to this. She'd thrown herself into her clan techniques recently and was just itching to practice her mindwalking interrogation out in the field.

Ino might not have been a genius like Shikamaru, but she worked hard in her own way, same as Naruto. Doubly so given the recent events. In between Orochimaru crippling Kakashi-sensei, and Shikamaru nearly receiving the same at the hands of Itachi Uchiha (the thought of Shikamaru without a functioning mind was ten times worse than Kakashi-sensei without chakra), she had no time for daydreaming or boys anymore.

Not that there had been any time for that the day she became a true shinobi. She had to grow up. They all did.

Especially now.

" _What in the…_ " Shikamaru swore.

Anko's teammates were crouching around several strings of caution tape. "It was like this when we found him."

The Head Secretary was lying in a puddle of his own blood, his throat slashed. All of the guards inside the room were similarly dead. And all of the guards stationed outside the room claimed they hadn't heard a sound.

* * *

 **A/N: Ino's family raised her to read people (the mind jutsu) and plants (the flower shop) from an early age, so her talents lie in grouping and identification.**

 **Shikamaru's strengths lie in deductive reasoning, strategy, analysis, etc. Which is also helpful in psychology and chem, but his background is less comprehensive than Ino's. He learned as much as he could about a lot of things when he was a child, but Ino got the trade secrets about more obscure stuff.**


	35. Neither Victory Nor Defeat

BONUS #30:

 _Danzo_

[wwwdot] fanfiction [dotnet] /forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/

* * *

 _The Konoha General Hospital_

"He's not going to die; stop freaking out." Tsunade lifted a glowing green palm to Hiashi Hyuga's face – or what was left of it. All the blood should have scared her – except that the fist-shaped sinkhole in his face was too funny to ignore. Maybe she was finally getting better. Inoichi Yamanaka had informed her that things like phobias took a while to disappear, and people rarely mustered up the willpower to overcome them in an instant.

Hanabi Hyuga pulled herself up over the side of the hospital bed. "Will he be okay?"

"No brain damage except for a minor concussion; it's just the front of his face that's been obliterated. That will take a bit longer to fix. He'll look a little…lumpy in the meantime." She frowned, and stooped over to pick a patch of splinters out from a wound on Hiashi Hyuga's upper lip. It glinted in the light – laminated, and waxed over. Probably a piece of furniture or floorboard. "But, may I ask, how did he get these injuries?"

Furniture or floorboard – it didn't matter which. The fact that either of those things had been splintered to pieces was frightening enough. From the patches of pulsing chakra still dancing around his broken face, Tsunade could tell that he had been forced to expel a great deal of power through his tenketsu to soften the blow somewhat. If Hiashi Hyuga had been any less of a ninja –if he hadn't managed to call up that much chakra, or if he hadn't had fast enough reactions to be able to create that defensive pillow around his head in time – he would have suffered a lot worse than a minor concussion.

Maybe a piece of his own skull going through his brain…

"Hinata hit him," Hanabi Hyuga said.

Wait – what?

Hinata, as in the "disappointing" daughter? The one that was supposed to be super shy and quiet all the time?

Tsunade looked skeptically at her patient's smashed face. "She…hit him? As in, the Gentle Fist, hit him? Really?" The Gentle Fist did internal injuries, harder to spot and harder to heal. Not…whatever this was.

"No. It was not the Gentle Fist. She just…punched him," Neji Hyuga said slowly.

Hanabi chewed her lip. "To be fair, he _did_ say that the first person unconscious…of course, he's the clan head, and he can't be branded, even if he did lose face." She looked down. "Technically, I'm supposed to be, too, but since Hinata's gone

So she snapped. The girl finally snapped. Tsunade had been wondering when.

"Thank you, Neji, Hanabi. You may go home." Tsunade turned back to her patient. "I know you're awake, Hiashi. I've already finished healing your face. Stop pretending."

Hiashi grunted.

"What the hell happened to that girl?" Tsunade asked.

Hiashi grunted again.

"Hyuga…" Tsunade warned.

"I will not deny respect for strength when I see it," he acknowledged grudgingly, completely avoiding the question. "Now she is gone and not my problem anymore."

Tsunade didn't even have to search his blank eyes for that obvious lie. "Really."

Hiashi Hyuga did not answer.

"The Hyuga clan is the most powerful and numerous clan in Konoha," Tsunade snapped. "If there is any instability, the Hokage will need to know. I'm not an idiot, Hiashi; I grew up in a powerful clan too. To allow her to leave without consequence will no doubt fracture the clan, but since she's clearly proven herself strong enough to be heir, punishing her will also make you seem weak and insecure."

"Do you think I don't know that?" he growled. "Yes, she defeated me. I cannot lie about that. But she did not use the Gentle Fist. It goes against the Hyuga way – "

"Neji Hyuga was defeated with genjutsu in the Chunin exam finals. I'd say the Hyuga way needs a bit of restructuring," Tsunade muttered under her breath.

"Watch your tongue, woman."

A shame Hinata had only smashed his nose and not his jaw. As it was, however, Hiashi Hyuga was perfectly capable of forcing her to listen to him talk. "Or what?"

"The weight of your grandfather's name recedes every day – "

"I don't give a damn about the weight of my grandfather's name. The strength of my fist is more than enough for any of you pansies. Take me on. I dare you." Tsunade slammed the bedside tray down with unnecessary force. Hiashi Hyuga remained silent. "That's what I thought."

She was about to leave the room when Hiashi Hyuga spoke again. "If I let her go, I cannot win; if I punish her, I cannot win. But hypothetically, if someone were to interfere in such a way that I would not have to make a choice in the first place…"

Tsunade turned around and put her hands on her hips. "Really? You're really suggesting this?"

"That is the only thing I can think of that can be reasonably implemented in time." He closed his eyes. "An unmarked Hyuga alone in the world is a dangerous thing, and there is nothing more I can do for her."

* * *

It had taken an inordinate amount of effort, but Hiashi was finally able to chase the damned Senju woman out. He hated hearing her talk, because her words always made too much sense. Sense was about the last thing he wanted right now. All he wanted to do was lie there and stew in his own miserable failures.

 _Too much like her mother,_ Hiashi thought. _Always her mother's daughter. Never mine._

Perhaps that was why he preferred Hanabi. Perhaps that was why he and Hinata would never see eye-to-eye.

He did not understand her. He only wanted the best for her. Only wished for her to survive in this world of theirs. Her mother had been a kind woman, and it had not saved her. For shinobi, strength was the only language, the only payment. Her lack of self-assertion would get her killed, both on the battlefield and within this pit of vipers that was Konoha.

The world was not safe. Not even within the walls of Konoha.

He had tried so hard to make her see that. But when he pushed her to become stronger, she gave up on him. And when he gave up on her, she pushed herself – in the completely wrong direction. Where had she come from? What was she, if not a Hyuga?

It mattered not now. She was out of his control. He had already done what he could, to prevent the clan elders from ordering her arrested and branded with the Curse Seal. His only task now was to make sure the clan remained stable. He was not one to wish death on others, and so he did not wish death upon Hinata. But if death came to her, then he no longer had any pretense of power to prevent it, for he was no longer her father.

So Hiashi Hyuga shut himself off from his wife's daughter (for he was not her father, no longer her father, perhaps had never even _been_ her father, even though he had undoubtedly fathered her) and hoped that severing all physical ties would be enough to sever the emotional ones as well.

* * *

 _Tanyu_

The Head Secretary looked as Naruto had expected, in an unexpected way. He was a rotund, bepectacled man, a result of too much time hunched over a desk with a pen in one hand and a snack in the other instead of exercising. But he didn't look very much like the most powerful man in the country. Or, as the fancy people at court would say, there was something extremely undignified in death that ill-befitted a man of his stature.

That didn't surprise Naruto much. He had come to learn that everyone was the same in death.

"Definitely shinobi work this time," Shikamaru said, taking care to avoid the wet splotches on the carpet. He couldn't tell if it was blood or some other liquid, because the whole thing was already dyed a dark red. "But why? Lady Arakawa wanted him gone; that much is certain, but she wouldn't have gone through the trouble to demand Konoha shinobi if she could get rid of him this way. Only the Daimyo himself could have ordered this, but the Head Secretary is too necessary to the country to execute without absolute proof of wrongdoing. Whether or not it's related to Lord Isayama's suicide, this is the work of a non-Konoha faction."

"Iwa," Jiraiya muttered.

"What?"

Jiraiya handed Naruto the tiny torn strip of thick maroon-colored cloth the Hyuga guy had picked up. "No other village makes its uniforms in this color. We use dark colors, same as Suna and Kiri, and Kumo nin wear grey."

The Inuzuka held it up to his nose. "Well, it's definitely Earth Country material."

Naruto felt a shiver run up his arms as his brain went through the possibilities. In his time with Shikamaru, his friend had always taught him to think ahead. "Does this mean we're going to war now, with Iwa?" he asked. He had always wanted attention, and glory, and cool missions. Not war, though. Never war. Never ever.

"War?" said Shikamaru. "Yes. Now? Hopefully not; the Hokage should be able to buy us another year at least, if he plays his cards right. With Iwa? Not necessarily. Although Konoha and Iwa _do_ invariably find themselves on opposite sides in just about any given conflict, I doubt they were the ones who started this. Which is rare, as far as conspiracies in the shinobi world go."

"What makes you say that?" asked Anko.

Shikamaru rolled his eyes. "Come on, really? A very heavily-guarded, high-ranking official assassinated without a sound? How the hell do such high trained, dangerously skilled people neglect to clean up after themselves? And don't tell me they left in a hurry because they weren't expecting the presence of Konoha nin. Iwa nin have a reputation for being brutish and backstabbing, not stupid. Plus, he's been dead for hours. Plenty of time to dispose of something like that. Also? These people were silently killed – no sign of a struggle; these guys were fast and did their job well. Look how thick the cut on this cloth is. How did such sturdy material, designed to withstand rough, rocky terrain, just randomly detach itself like this?"

Naruto wasn't even surprised anymore. "You think someone else framed Iwa."

"A lot of people would have something to gain if Konoha and Iwa went to war," Jiraiya said. "Both outside and inside the village," he whispered darkly. "In all honesty, the five villages have been due for a conflict for quite some time. Only, someone's trying to accelerate it along." He stood up. "This has to get back to the Hokage. Fast. Another tracker team will be needed. This could be S-rank. And tell him we suspect Akatsuki involvement."

Oh, joy. They were only supposed to be here for a B-rank cover-up. How did it turn into multiple deaths and two conspiracies so quickly? A tiny, immature part of Naruto was excited that he was finally getting to participate in such an awesome, _real_ shinobi mission…but that was quickly squashed out by the amount of responsibility and stress implicated by the new murders. The kid in him wanted to go out and catch bad guys, but his brain told him there was more to it than that. What would become of them, _after_ said "bad guys" were caught?

 _This is what you get for trying to think ahead,_ Naruto told himself. _You open up a bunch of new problems on top of the ones you already have to deal with._ Naruto stole a glance at Shikamaru, who was still staring at the corpse, deep in thought. This must have been what his teammate dealt with on a daily basis. Were all super-smart people stuck like this? Constantly making plans about things yet to come because they were unable to stifle their own curiosity?

Gods, that would suck. The more you knew, the more you worried. No wonder they said that ignorance was bliss. Then again, being ignorant could end in sorrow, too.

Shikamaru quickly glanced up. "Are you sure it's Akatsuki?"

"Or one of the foreign villages," said Jiraiya. "But definitely not us, because we're not stupid enough to alienate our best sponsors by assassinating the Daimyo's closest advisor and risking ending up like another Suna. Right?"

Shikamaru hesitated, and then the cloud over his eyes disappeared. "…Right. Of course. It's definitely Akatsuki or a foreign village, and not someone associated with Konoha in any way," he repeated robotically.

"But what about Lady Arakawa?" Ino asked.

"She'll have to content herself with knowing the man is dead," Shikamaru said. "Her reaction to all of this should be enlightening, to say the least. Although…"

He trailed off and sat in silence. Wonderful. He was having another one of his "idea moments".

Anko walked over to them. "Something wrong?"

"Anko…besides the height of the candle, could we also use poison concentration to figure out how long it's been burning?" Shikamaru asked.

She thought about that. "Yes, I suppose. Why?"

Shikamaru shrugged. "I just want to double-check something."

"I don't know if we can use the corpse; it might throw off our calculations. And the bathroom he died in has been vented, so no go on that either. We'd need a different absorber," Anko said.

"We took a bunch of things from the bathroom earlier and stored them in plastic baggies," Ino mentioned. "Sponges, potted plants, and so on. Surely one of them could work."

"Yes, yes, that might work," Anko murmured. "If you've isolated them in nonpermeable bags then it might work. I'll go take a look at that. Is this important, Shikamaru?"

He shrugged. "It could be."

* * *

Ino frowned at the vapor chamber she and Anko had set up. "This doesn't make sense. Did we do something wrong? Is air escaping from here somehow?"

"The indicators show no trace of the poison leaving the box, so no," said Anko.

"But no matter what we do, we're only getting twenty minutes' worth of poison from all of these samples, not an hour. Even if we had experimental error, that's still a ridiculously massive margin," said Ino. "And yet the candle height shows that it was burning for at least that long. Could they have leaked…? But all of them, in equal amounts? How is that possible? We're missing something, here…"

She turned to Shikamaru questioningly, wondering what he was planning. Actually, she was wondering what _everyone_ was planning. What had started as a simple mission had exploded into a tangled web involving, now, five teams. Team 7 and Anko's team, still on the case of Lord Isayama. Two more ANBU teams tracking down the supposed Iwa nin (or whoever it was) that had killed the Head Secretary. And Yamato's team, once guarding Lady Arakawa, now headed back to the capital at Shikamaru's request.

This was all so stupidly complicated.

Shikamaru made no comment. Naruto, wearing gloves and a mask this time, tentatively poked at one of the unburnt candles with a kunai.

 _A kunai –_

"If a candle was cut to be shorter…like, with a knife…you could make it look like it burned for longer, even though it didn't…" She turned to Shikamaru. "You think someone manually messed with the candle height."

"I had my suspicions that everything fell into place _too_ perfectly," Shikamaru confessed. "I didn't want them to interfere with your experiments, however. In case I was looking into things too deeply, I wanted to see if someone else could come up with the same conclusion on their own."

"What do you mean?"

"Well, for starters…if I wanted someone dead, I wouldn't poison a gift basket that an entire hallway's worth of servants saw came from me," said Shikamaru. "I don't know why the Head Secretary is dead. I don't know if it even has anything to do with _this_ particular death, come to think of it. But I _do_ know that if we want to solve this case, we have to find out what exactly was in the letter that drove Lady Arakawa to take action against the Head Secretary."

"Conveniently, one of two people who know the answer are dead," said Jiraiya. "That's why you chose to recall Yamato's team."

"Hopefully both Lady Arakawa's team and the ANBU teams make it back safely," Shikamaru said. "We're either looking at one plot or two. And they could be connected, or not at all. Maybe some other enemy was already planning the demise of the Head Secretary, and it was coincidence that he died the same day we went to arrest him. Or maybe they took advantage of us being here to kill him. Or maybe it's the mysterious letter that ties Lady Arakawa, Lord Isayama, and the Head Secretary together. We won't know until they get back."

"So…the poisoned candles?" Naruto said.

The question was, what did they want to believe. Either both Anko and Ino, in all their experience, was making a very stupid mistake that was giving them such massive errors in their time measurements, or someone had tampered with the candles, knowing that they could be used to help with timing.

…As per Lady Arakawa's earlier suggestion.

The woman knew more than she was letting on.

"Lord Isayama didn't hit a major artery when he slit his wrists," Shikamaru explained. "He was bleeding out very, very slowly. No awkward bloodstains or splashes to indicate he moved from the tub after he cut himself, meaning someone else entered the room and messed with those candles as he was dying."

Ino immediately picked up on Shikamaru's train of thought, as did Naruto. She wasn't as good as coming up with things on her own, but given the right hints she could come to the same conclusion as Shikamaru. They were getting better at connecting their thinking lately, even if their specialized skills were starting to take them down individual paths.

Lord Isayama, and a mystery person. Perhaps both of them knew the candle was poisoned, and this was a suicide pact. If the slit wrists didn't go as planned, the accomplice would light the candles and give him a faster death. Or perhaps neither knew – but that was unlikely, because whoever walked in on all that blood would have screamed and gone to report it. No, whoever lit the candle intended to kill Lord Isayama – with or without his knowledge. And their resident Inuzuka had informed them that the only other people that had entered the bathroom today were the guards on duty…or Lady Arakawa.

That was the sloppiest part of the suicide. Murder. Whatever. A proper killer would try to get rid of the evidence, including the candles. Why leave them out there where anyone could pick them up and reveal the poison, like Naruto had? Why increase their risk of revealing the truth and getting caught so highly?

"Because they _wanted_ someone to find it," Shikamaru declared. "Because they _wanted_ to get caught. Because this wasn't a murder dressed up as a suicide – this was a suicide dressed up as a murder. Oh, hello, Lady Arakawa. So _nice_ of you to join us."

* * *

Lady Arakawa was naturally incredibly upset at her current treatment. "What are you doing?" she snapped. "Why have you brought me back here? The Head Secretary means to kill me, and here you are playing your little games – "

"Want to hear a hypothetical story, Lady Arakawa?" I asked. Before she could answer, I decided to pull an Ino and said, "What am I talking about? Of course you do."

"Excuse me – "

"Once upon a time, there were two uneasy allies. We'll call them A and B. Now, A has been thinking of replacing B for awhile. But he can't let B walk away with all that information, so the logical thing would be to kill her. Right?"

"Right," she said grudgingly, probably wondering where I was going with this and how long it was going to take.

"So A gives her this gift basket full of poisoned goods. Perhaps a bar of soap or a piece of candy would do the trick. She passes away without any fanfare, and he's free to do what he likes for the rest of his days.

"Unfortunately, B's son – we'll call him C – gets into the gift basket before she does. He borrows a candle, lights it, slits his wrists in the tub, and dies. And now, A is in a great deal of trouble. This is what we're _supposed_ to believe."

Lady Arakawa narrowed her eyes. "It's what happened!"

I put my hand on my chin. "But this is a hypothetical story."

Her mouth twisted into an ugly frown. "We both know that's not true."

"The hypothetical part, or the story part?" I asked. "Because even though the height of the candle suggests it was burning for an hour, poison concentrations of not one, but several objects from the site of death indicate it couldn't have burned for more than twenty minutes. You told us you put out the candle as soon as you and the guards walked into the room, and the guards confirmed this. Therefore, the candle started burning _after_ Lord Isayama stepped into the tub.

"We know Lord Isayama never stepped out of the tub after his attempted suicide. That means someone else walked into the room after he slit his wrists, and lit the poisoned candle. Someone who deliberately shortened the height of the candle before lighting it, to make it look like it was burning for longer than it actually was."

She remained silent.

I smiled. "How about another hypothetical story?"

"I would rather not – "

"Of _course_ you want to hear it. Fine. We'll start over with A and B. Now, A has been thinking of replacing B for awhile. But he can't let B walk away with all that information, so the logical thing would be to kill her. Right?"

She was silent.

" _Right?_ " I pressed.

Lady Arakawa looked down. "Right," she muttered.

"But…B also knows this. It's practically a given, in a place like this, that people who outlive their usefulness don't outlive it for very long. So…B prepares a preemptive strike, to get rid of A before he can get rid of her.

"So one day, when her son, C, attempts suicide, instead of trying to save him like all those other times, she puts him out of his misery by euthanizing him. Maybe she really did love him too much; I didn't know him when he was alive so I wouldn't be able to judge the extent of his depression. Or maybe, she was trying to get rid of her worthless suicidal son so that she could take control of his inheritance, possibly using it as leverage for a potential powerful remarriage. I won't go into the moral arguments of an assisted suicide, but even without that, B is still a murderer."

Not a murder disguised as suicide. A poorly researched, _attempted_ suicide turned into a murder disguised as another murder by someone else.

What the hell.

"And, of course, all the evidence is already set up – from everything else in that gift basket poisoned ahead of time, to the servants willing to testify, to the manually shortened candle used to throw off our timing estimations…she had an answer for everything. The Head Secretary's incarceration was practically a given. He's about to go off to the chopping block, and she's won."

"And the shinobi hired have no proof to the contrary," she said coldly, "except for a few trinkets that might just have absorbed poison differently. Too bad."

"Perhaps not," I said, "but it _does_ cause enough doubt to warrant an interrogation. My teammate is a Yamanaka, Lady Arakawa. Surely you know what that means?"

She did know. Her impassive exterior shattered into abject terror. _So I was right, then. Everything was her doing. But she was clever; she had an answer for everything, and we have no evidence apart from a mismatched time of death. Had we been any other village, without the Yamanaka clan, she could have gotten away with it._

A solemn chill washed over me. Normally, solving half of such a convoluted mystery would have given me some measure of satisfaction. But I felt no joy in informing Lady Arakawa that there was no way out of this. "By all laws, this warrants an execution."

She fell to her knees.

"Please," she whispered. "He would have killed me anyway. Maybe not with the gift basket, but you know he would have – "

"You still killed someone," I said, signaling for Jiraiya and Naruto to double-check the perimeter one last time before Lady Arakawa began her confession. "You killed your own son and framed an innocent man – well, not so innocent, I'm sure, given his high rank and position, but innocent of this particular crime. Why should I spare your life?"

"Because I can help you," she begged. "I know things! Just let me live; I'll tell you everything you need to know – more! The Head Secretary and I used to have a deal! I gave him information, and he would give me money and legal aid…but then one of my spies – er, maids – informed me that he was going to replace me with real shinobi! How can I compete with that? I knew too much for him to let me live – "

"So you acted first, hoping to take him out in a preemptive strike. Your son was dying anyway and you took advantage of his death to frame another man for murder." I shook my head. Even if I _was_ willing to team up with someone like that, she wasn't exactly the type of person I wanted to attach myself to. How did she ever think she could get away with such a massively complicated plan that hinged upon so many things outside of her control? "Well, I hope you're pleased with yourself, because the Head Secretary is now dead, just like you always wanted."

She froze. "Executed? Already?"

"No. He was also murdered. Only a few hours ago. I had you recalled for questioning, but I suppose you had nothing to do with that."

Lady Arakawa shook her head. "I did not. Assassinations are expensive."

"I imagine an army of shinobi spies must be even more so," I said. "Just how was he planning to pay for them?"

Ino passed me a memory from Lady Arakawa. A maid was whispering in her ear.

 _"Not money, but votes."_

Shit.


	36. Water Demons

**A/N: Sorry about the slow update. Had a rough few weeks (months, actually). To make it up to you guys, the holidays are getting close so hopefully I'll be able to rebuild my update buffer then. Shooting for getting the next chapter out by next week to make up for this month-long dry spell.**

 **By the way, I know this arc is seemingly getting complex, so remember that Shikamaru isn't operating with all possible information. The truth is fairly simple, and Shikamaru's overcomplicating because he is trying to account for all possibilities. To help you out, I've made a quick chart which I plan to post next update.**

* * *

BONUS #31

 _Poison_

[www] fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/157261502/1/Bonus-31-Poison-Lore

* * *

 _Tanyu_

The Head Secretary. Conversing with shinobi. To the point where his resident spymaster felt so threatened that she had tried to get him killed. Now, he was permanently silenced, and the people asking for his power were still unknown.

This could mean one of two things.

One, Konoha really was involved in this, and we had simply been too low in the chain of command to know, either through Jiraiya, or through my own dalliances in the secure mission room. Perhaps this was an emergency silencing, or punishment for breaking a contract, and any moment now ANBU would be dropping from the ceilings to escort us to more secure premises. In this case, the best choice of action would be to get the hell out of here ASAP and pretend I didn't know anything.

Or two, there were third-party ninja involved. A kill like this from non-Konoha nin would make more sense, because surely our ANBU would have at least tried to warn Jiraiya. Waiting until everyone returned to home base to explain why two missions crossed roads was just asking for collisions. Then, the best choice of action would be to let the Hokage know that we knew about these…ninja.

To me, the most obvious answer was, once again, Danzo Shimura, which would satisfy both the case of a Konoha shinobi while also being a third party. And it would also explain how the expenses could be so well-hidden.

Except, I wasn't supposed to know about him in the first place.

(Then there was also the matter of how I was actually completely and utterly wrong, but that was for a different time.)

 _Fuck,_ I thought. _I came here to make allies and gather blackmail, not accidentally discover a possible consipiracy!_

My only hope now was to lie low and act like I was of above-average intelligence. Most shinobi in Konoha knew that I was smart, so I couldn't pull off the same clueless act Naruto normally did, but, as my father had taught me, that didn't mean I had to show everyone _exactly_ how smart I was. All I had to do was invent the most logical but wrong conclusion I could have drawn in this situation. Easy.

(You know how I said I was completely and utterly wrong? I mean it. I was so wrong, that I was actually wrong about being wrong.)

(And if you're confused, don't worry. So was I.)

(I'll explain everything later; promise.)

Anyway, I took a deep breath, and proclaimed quite loudly, "Well, obviously, the Akatsuki had something to do with it."

"The Akatsuki?" Naruto asked, confused at my sudden topic change. "But why would they want to kill the Head Secretary?"

"They probably had nothing against him personally. But anything that would weaken the villages and drive them to war with each other would benefit them." The lie came easily to me, made even more easy by the fact that in any other circumstance, it would be the truth.

"Oh. That makes sense," said Naruto.

I wondered when everything would come tumbling down on me.

 _I'll explain as much of the truth as I can to Naruto and Ino later,_ I promised myself. _Just as soon as we clean up this ridiculous mess._

I wondered how much Jiraiya knew.

"What are we going to do with _her_ , though?" Naruto said, pointing to Lady Arakawa.

I shrugged. "I mean, murder and framing someone else for murder is a capital crime." I looked at Lady Arakawa. "Theoretically, however, someone could avoid the regular humiliation and pain that comes with a public beheading. Or however they execute people here." Konoha's style was more of making people disappear mysteriously in the night. "It's not impossible for a grieving mother to put her depressed son out of his misery, and then kill herself out of guilt before anyone could question her."

Lady Arakawa burst into tears. Ino crossed her arms. "Shikamaru…"

"I'm not saying she _has_ to," I protested. "But what choice do we have? It's not like we can let her get away with this. If we turn her over to the Daimyo's guards, they'll definitely kill her, publicly and painfully. That is, if they don't decide that she needs more questioning than we already gave her first."

She froze, and then quietly retreated to her chambers with a poisoned sweet from the pink basket in her hand, still guarded by Yamato's team.

We heard some crying, and then silence.

I didn't know if I should have felt bad or not. Catching her had been my duty in the first place, and it wasn't as if I personally knew her. She had brought this upon herself, thinking what she had tried to do was okay.

Then there was also the fact that she knew Konoha nin were potentially involved in the Head Secretary's murder, and as a Konoha nin myself I couldn't let her run away and tell the Daimyo about this in exchange for clemency. Not if I didn't want us to turn into another Suna.

"What about the Head Secretary?" Naruto asked.

Jiraiya paced about on the floor. "Right. Here's what's going on the official report. Lord Isayama attempted suicide, and was found by his mother. She couldn't bear to see him in pain, and, in an emotionally-charged poor decision, decided to put him out of his misery. After realizing what she had done, Lady Arakawa killed herself out of guilt. The Head Secretary himself was killed in an entirely isolated incident, where some third party, most likely the Akatsuki, attempted to drive Iwa and Konoha to war. As far as we're concerned, that's what happened, and no one knows anything else at all. No shinobi were involved, except for the Akatsuki. Is that understood?" Jiraiya asked.

Naruto started. "But – "

"Naruto, please, just say yes," Jiraiya snapped. "I'll take care of it."

"But the Hokage – "

"Naruto. I will personally tell him the truth. The paper reports are for everyone else. Right now, your orders are to keep yourselves above suspicion. _Is that understood?_ "

Naruto hung his head. "I understand."

Jiraiya ruffled his hair. "I'll let the Hokage know; don't worry."

There was protest in his posture, however, and I knew that for him, this wasn't over. Same as me. Of course it wasn't over. Naruto wouldn't give up so easily. But he was better at controlling his timing now, learning to put his attacks where his opponents would be weakest and waiting for the right time and place to ask his armor-piercing questions, rather than throwing barrage after barrage of force right away.

I knew why Jiraiya was doing this. Whether the Hokage had personally authorized this, to get the village more influence, or whether someone else (Danzo) had done this for personal gain, we shouldn't have known about it. There could be trouble, if we revealed our hand so quickly, both from the village and from the Daimyo, who was expecting Konoha nin to work with and not against him. Jiraiya was offering to probe for himself, first.

But I had no doubt that the Daimyo would buy any story we gave him if we just presented it properly, and meanwhile, my friendship with Izumo and Kotetsu ensured that any report we wrote on this would be quickly filed away with little scrutiny.

Funny, how close the Head Secretary had come to getting away with it. If Lady Arakawa hadn't come up with her half-baked "woman scorned" revenge scheme we would have never found out about this in the first place. In a way, we had her to thank for our knowledge

"You'll tell us how it turns out, right?" I asked Jiraiya.

"When I can."

Now the only person we had left to take care of was the informant that had told Lady Arakawa of the "betrayal" in the first place. I closed my eyes and reviewed the memory Ino had passed on to me. This time, instead of reading the letter, I concentrated on the face of the maid, instead.

It was the Butterfly.

* * *

 _Konoha_

As soon as the high from her newfound freedom had worn off – which was about a minute – Hinata was back to being terrified.

Oh, gods above, what had she been thinking? How idiotic was she, to think that something like that would work? She was pretty sure that in about thirty seconds, Hyuga clan members would be swarming her, to drag her back to the clan compound and brand her for her dishonor to the clan head. There was nowhere she could run or hide, not with the power and influence of the Hyuga clan.

The Byakugan would root her out of any alleyway or crate; the clan itself would force any lesser clan to turn her over. Not even Choji or Sasuke could interfere in Hyuga matters; it was in the rules of Konoha that a major clan had utmost authority over its own members. And even if that law wasn't there, it still wouldn't work. The Akimichi were a noble clan, but they were nothing compared to the Hyuga. And while once upon a time the Uchiha outranked the Hyuga, that was the past. Sasuke was a boy barely older than she was, with no clansmen to back him up. The Hokage himself could not tell the Hyuga clan how to run itself, or else this business with the Cursed Seal would have been done with a long time ago.

A shadow fell over her. So this was it. They were here at last.

But the voice that spoke was not anyone in her family.

"Heard you got yourself into a spot of trouble, kid."

She looked up, and paled. "Tsunade-sama," she said quickly, getting to her feet.

"Just so you know, I healed your father without any problems. More importantly, where'd you learn to punch like that?"

Hinata could only stare, mouth hanging slightly open. What was she getting at?

"I – I don't know – "

"So you taught yourself?"

"I don't know? I just got mad, and then I – "

"So you never even practiced. It just came naturally to you."

Hinata bit her lipped and nodded.

And then Tsunade's grin turned feral.

"How would you like to become my apprentice?"

 _What_.

"Cat got your tongue, girl? I asked you a question."

Tsunade. This was Tsunade of the Sannin. And she was talking to _her_. _Her,_ Hinata Hyuga, the disgrace to her clan. Being offered an apprenticeship under the most powerful kunoichi in the Five Elemental Nations.

What was happening to her? One moment, she had been going over what she might say to Choji's parents to allow her to stay with them while she figured out what to do, and the next, one of the Sandaime Hokage's students was offering her a job…

"Yes! – I mean, _yes_. Of course."

"Well, that's the easy part over with. Here's a harder question – what do _you_ think you'll accomplish learning under me? What do you _want_ to accomplish?" Tsunade stopped and looked at her expectantly.

What was she going to say? Hinata was almost afraid to open her mouth. It was – she couldn't speak. What if she said something so unbelievably stupid that Tsunade changed her opinion of her and didn't take her on at all –

No. _Not_ saying anything was the stupid choice. Tsunade-sama was asking her and expecting an answer in return. Nothing was more telling than cowardice.

"I want…something besides the Clan. I want something other than the Gentle Fist. I want to use the Byakugan for its true intended purpose – I want to be known as Hinata – I want to be _somebody_ , and not just another Hyuga! But most of all, I want to be able to help people without being held back by a house built on slavery!"

Tsunade smiled at her. "You pass. Welcome aboard."

Hinata frowned. "…This – was this supposed to – to be a test?"

"It was a test to see if you would say anything at all," Tsunade grinned. "I'm glad to see you're no longer silent. Come on, kid; let's go. We've got work to do."

* * *

 _Kakashi's Hiding-From-Gai-Spot #59_

"Dammit, sensei," Kakashi mumbled. The papers scattered across the table and fluttered to the ground. In the back of his mind, he was vaguely aware of the total mess he must have looked like right now.

It wasn't that the work was _impossible_ , necessarily. He definitely was in a better position to decode Minato-sensei's notes, compared to Jiraiya. It was hard to concentrate, though, when his team was a world away, facing some unknown danger. If anything happened, he'd be powerless to help.

 _You're still powerless here,_ he reminded himself. _You're not going to change anything by moping. Succeed in your mission, prove that you are ready, and only then can you rejoin your students in the field._

Most people only ever thought of one sealing language in existence – the standard script of Uzushiogakure, written in the calligraphy that made up their daily language.

But Minato-sensei, who was very fond of discussing the theoretical – why rely on just one sealing script? Why not make up your own? At the time, Kakashi had snorted in disbelief. Reinventing something that was never broken seemed like a complete waste of time, considering that shinobi didn't have a lot of time to spare. After listening to some of what Minato-sensei had to say, however, he had to admit it _was_ interesting.

Through some extremely complex, yet elegantly simple proofs, Minato-sensei had shown him that the full functionality of Uzushiogakure's standard script could be replicated perfectly as long as they followed a few basic rules, which all summarized the ability to mold and combine chakra in a reliable manner. Because that was a sealing language at its heart, really. Molding and combining chakra on an external surface instead of inside the body, as with hand seals.

The reason _why_ different "languages" could and should be used, Minato-sensei had then told him, was because certain things could be expressed more easily than others depending on what they were. For example, numbers could be represented in words or in figures, but the latter was definitely cleaner even though they both meant the same thing.

The Uzushiogakure script worked well for trapping things in scrolls and sealing away bijuu in people, as the complexities of calligraphy served as natural passcode-operated gates. When it came to the Hiraishin, and probably other space-time ninjutsu, however, Minato-sensei's script was far superior. Mathematical structuring not only made a naturally hazardous endeavor much safer, but also reduced chakra consumption to a level fit for repeated human use.

Whereas Tobirama's method with the standard script could only work for someone with a ton of chakra, or multiple people working together (the reason why the Hokage guard had to work in teams of at least three to transport someone), Minato-sensei could use his technique hundreds of times without breaking a sweat.

He knew, if he could just match up those basic rules to the most repetitive sections of Minato-sensei's work, he could reverse-engineer the entire language. Sadly, for all of their reputation and skills as thorough teachers and organizers, both Tobirama Senju and Minato Namikaze seemed very fond of skipping steps on paper. As in, going from point A to point D without explaining where points B and C went.

Funny, seeing as that was the entire…purpose…of teleportation…

 _The gods of irony must be rolling on the floor._

* * *

 _The REAL Village Hidden in the Mist_

The nice thing about the more powerful villages, Mei thought, was that they were so egocentric. Bad if you had to deal with them directly; good if you wanted to use them. _Especially_ good if you wanted to use them against _each other_ while remaining unnoticed yourself. Not being taken seriously for a number of things – such as not having some fancy nickname, or having a mediocre bounty in the international Bingo Books at best, or being from a backwater village that everyone liked to forget about (literally) – suited her purposes quite well, for the time being.

Yagura wore the robes and hat of the Mizukage, but only an idiot would think that he was the one actually calling the shots. He had been selected to rule the Hidden Mist because he had been an intelligent and logical shinobi, not because he was powerful and bloodthirsty. That was not his way; had never been his way. He had been the only one calm enough to successfully tame the Three-Tails after all those years of the Mist not knowing what the hell to do with their bijuu (including one incredibly idiotic plan involving kidnapping some dumb girl from Konoha that had resulted in hundreds of their own shinobi dead).

Yagura should have been the greatest Mizukage they had ever seen, not the worst.

The first time his eyes had flashed red, everyone had pretended not to notice. Then the psychosis set in, and they thought it was the tailed beast that was driving him mad.

But then Mei noticed a pattern to his madness, starting from the categorical genocide of all bloodline limits in the Hidden Mist, and realized that no ancient chakra monster could have manufactured such detailed plans to weaken – no, not just that; _systematically tear apart_ − their village all by itself.

Yagura – or Mr. Sharingan, take your pick – still ruled over the original Kirigakure, but neither of them were aware that there was a second Kirigakure under Mei's control. It had no buildings, or roads, or shops. No one did business with this Kirigakure. But all the same, her people stood tall and proud, for it was simply connected and organized by one idea: freedom.

Or, less eloquently: murder the assholes responsible for all the shit the Mist had been put through. Because, honestly? You knew you hit a new low when your village was getting pissed on even more than the Sand. But never let it be said that Mei Terumi didn't know how to take advantage of a bad situation – because being the ignored village meant that people didn't keep a close eye on your actions, and when people didn't keep a close eye on your actions, they tended to underestimate you.

So let those old men from the Leaf and the Rock and the Cloud argue with each other about who was responsible for the Wave situation. Let them discount the Mist, because the Mist was "too weak and disjointed to be useful in anything." They hadn't bothered to send anyone to thoroughly spy on Kirigakure in years; Kirigakure itself hadn't seen any foreign visitors since Yagura first took power – one of the benefits of having to live under a man who took the definition of the word "paranoia" to the nines.

But that didn't mean the reverse of that statement was also true. Kirigakure was the silent observer. And Kirigakure knew things. Kirigakure sat in the shadows and _saw_ them all, while they were all wasting their time arguing amongst themselves.

Mei Terumi was the true Mizukage, even if she didn't have a nice office or desk.

One day, though. One day she would. One day, she'd be wearing that blue hat and robe for real, and she'd do it while standing over the drawn and quartered body of the person responsible for this entire mess. The Bloody Mist had been called the _Bloody_ Mist for a reason. And she had _grown up_ under that regime. What's more, she had _survived_ up until now, for this long. Everyone seemed to remember Zabuza Momochi as that one demon child that had murdered his entire graduating class (stupid, by the way, because that just decreased the amount of their able-bodied soldiers). No one seemed to remember that _she_ , Mei Terumi – or any other shinobi of their generation, actually – had also killed her own classmates to gain her hitai-ate.

There was a _reason_ why she was still alive, even when all the other kekkei genkai possessing people in Kirigakure were dead.

"Mission report, Momochi."

He rolled his eyes. "Do we _have_ to? Life as a missing-nin is very rough."

"Protocol," she smirked. "And you're not _actually_ a missing-nin. I pardoned you, remember?"

"According to Yagura I am," the man grumbled, but went through with the procedures anyway. "Word from Ao. The Yondaime Mizukage is still being puppeted by a mysterious Sharingan user. Just recently he sent out a team of some of our best ANBU to Tanyu. A high-ranking official in the Fire Daimyo's court was found murdered shortly after, and suspicions have been leveled against Iwa."

"Tanyu," Mei murmured. "Konoha won't like that."

"Iwa won't either," Zabuza said, "considering they had nothing to do with this, and are just itching for an excuse to gain back what they lost from Konoha in the past few wars. Meanwhile, there are a factions in both villages pointing fingers at a third party, like Kumo or the Akatsuki, wanting to drive Konoha and Iwa to blows so that they might reap the benefits in the confusion."

"They're half right. _Someone_ wants war." This was bad. Mist was already in a weakened state as it was. If word got out that _they_ were the ones causing strife between Konoha, Iwa, and who knew what else – even if they were doing so against their will – things could get ugly really quickly. She was not yet in a position to negotiate. "Do they suspect us?"

"I don't think so, no. As far as anyone is concerned, Mist is still useless and xenophobic."

"While this is good news, that those other villages are fighting each other, it's also bad," Mei explained. "If I was officially the Mizukage I would be rolling in glee right now…"

Ao understood. "It's the fact that _we_ weren't behind this conspiracy that worries you."

"Mr. Sharingan wants something, and we'll all be destroyed if he gets it. While I'm happy that those three old men are too busy snapping at each other to hurt us, it turns my stomach to know that we are all playing right into Mr. Sharingan's hands. I fear that there is a greater power at play here than just the five Kage."

"War on the mainland benefits us, but it benefits him even more," Ao agreed. "We can't let him gain more power than he already has."

"So what are we going to do about him?" Zabuza asked.

"The problem, Momochi, is that we have no idea _who_ he is. And until we figure out how to stop it, we can't let them know that we are on to them, or else we'll be dead faster than you can draw your sword," Mei said. "At first I suspected Konoha, but it turns out that no one there knows jack shit about anything, and even less so when the Uchihas were wiped out. More likely, it's someone acting individually, trying to get revenge on…something. I suspected Itachi Uchiha for a while, but then I did the math. He would have been a child in the Academy at the time we first noticed Yagura going crazy. According to my sources, he didn't master the Sharingan until he was eight."

"What makes you so sure?" Ao asked.

" _Because_ , if Konoha knew they had people who could mind-control the Kage of other villages long-term like this, they'd have used it already – on the Raikage and the Tsuchikage, who are their most dangerous foes. Not us. We haven't posed any threat to them in a long time. The only thing that we ever did to them _personally_ in recent memory was that attempted thing with the Three-Tails – which I _checked_ , only resulted in the death of one young girl. More of ours ended up dying than theirs, the battle was even, and we retreated. It was a while ago, long before even Yagura. This reaction is…disproportionate." Mei shook her head. "I know old man Sarutobi quite well, though he probably doesn't even know who I am. He doesn't do disproportionate. He's a very cautious player, by nature."

"If you don't mind me asking, _which_ girl got killed?" Zabuza asked.

Zabuza had only meant it to be a harmless question, but to Mei, it was so much more than that. That one question had been the key to the missing piece she had been searching for for this entire time. Mei couldn't believe she hadn't thought about it before.

 _Which girl was it?_

She had dismissed the identity of the girl as an important clue when she first began researching the botched Sanbi jinchuuriki mission, because she hadn't known her personally, and the girl hadn't been some powerful or famous nin anyway. But now that Zabuza had brought it back up…Konoha was big on this teammate thing, weren't they? It could very well be…

"I don't know," Mei admitted, the gears quickly turning in her mind. "The records I found didn't say, and I didn't care enough to dig any deeper. But – thinking about it again, she might be more important than I initially pegged her as. Ao, I want you to find everyone involved in that mess with the Three-Tails still alive today. Track down the identity of that girl. I want her name, her face, and every friend's acquaintance and cousin's cousin she had."

"You really think she might be the whole reason behind this entire mess?" Zabuza asked. "Just that one girl?"

"I don't know, but it would be foolish if we didn't try. Leave no stone unturned, Ao. We find out who she was, and we're one step closer to finding out the man behind Yagura. Momochi, I want you to track down the other Mist missing-nin who are actual missing-nin. Specifically, the ones who went rogue around the time Yagura came to power."

"All of them?" Zabuza deadpanned.

Mei shrugged. "Well. Until you get some answers. Start from the top down; it's unlikely that a Genin who quit because it got too hard will know anything."

"You realize, if I'm doing it that way, the guy I'm going to be starting with will be motherfucking Kisame Hoshigaki," Zabuza pointed out.

Mei clapped her hands. "Oh goody! You two can bond over your giant-ass swords."

Zabuza groaned.


	37. Viva la Revolution

_The Hyuga Clan Compound_

Never before, in the history of the clan, had anyone ever _run away_. Being a branch family member was better than being clan-less; that was the general consensus. But now that their heiress had _disappeared_ – well, not really; they'd be able to find her if they wanted to – it was causing a huge uproar within all levels of the clan.

For Hanabi, well, she didn't get why everyone was so surprised. For a clan so precious about their eyes, they were incredibly short on foresight. Anyone living under the constant threat of branding was bound to snap.

But there was no protocol for what to do if someone seceded from the clan. Missing-nin would be dealt with under Konoha law, but Hinata wasn't a missing-nin. She was still a citizen of Konoha, and was thus protected as a shinobi of the village. If they wanted to drag her out to court, they'd have to follow all the procedures just as if they were prosecuting another normal shinobi. The Caged Bird seal was specific to the clan only, not the rest of Konoha.

Konoha law specifically stated that anyone who was of age and wished to live separate from their family would be considered as an individual person. And since clans were just that – families – albeit very large and powerful ones – it meant that when Hinata had run away, she had become her own individual. Another run-of-the-mill ninja with no name or title.

If she was considered not a Hyuga, then the clan would not have the power to stamp her forehead. But she obviously still _had_ the Byakugan, and Hyuga law stated anyone with a Byakugan not in the main line needed the seal. And yet, Hinata had not technically _lost_ that spar, so she was not out of the line of succession yet.

But she was also no longer living within the Hyuga compound, and possession of a kekkei genkai did not automatically mean clan membership, as proven by Kakashi Hatake's case. Then again, he hadn't been _born_ with those eyes…

Then there was the matter of dangerous implications for the clan. Should Hinata's secession be legally recognized by Konoha's higher-ups, it would set a precedent: if any branch family member wanted to secede from the clan, in order to avoid the Caged Bird seal on their children, they could do so, breaking up the power of the clan.

Konoha's major economy was from shinobi services, but lawyers made a good living anywhere. And Hanabi could foresee the legal quagmire about this piling up for months.

Her father, naturally, expected her to take the clan's side about this. Hanabi, naturally, was taking Hinata's side. And she knew, deep down, that every other clan member with a mark on their forehead was praying for freedom, too.

* * *

 _Konoha – one of Kakashi's few hiding spots not yet found by Gai_

The most difficult part was already over, at least, in Kakashi's opinion. Most people never figured out how to breach the barrier between the three-dimensional earth-space and the extra sealing dimension required by teleportation. But Kakashi had had experience with Minato Namikaze's insane mathematical theories before, so it didn't take him long to catch on to that particular idea.

The tough part was in the execution. Kakashi just didn't understand how they expected this stuff to work. Sure, he could follow the numbers blindly and probably get the right result, but acting without understanding in seal work was extremely dangerous, and he wasn't taking any chances with his normally terrible luck.

Theoretically, teleportation was easy. Rather than drawing a line from point A to point B in earth-dimension, simply jump up to a higher dimension, cross there, and then jump back down to wherever you wanted to go. With the addition of a sealing dimension, bypassing time-dimension was easy (giving the illusion of instantaneous travel).

So the schematics were simple. Accessing bridge dimensions were one of the basic uses of sealing; anyone who could summon could understand this. But the execution was a different matter entirely.

There was still one part left for him to decipher, and that was, sadly, the center key around which the rest of the technique revolved.

Literally.

You couldn't teleport in space without a point of reference. But nowhere in his notes – and Kakashi had checked at least ten times − had Minato-sensei mentioned any points of reference.

In order to make the jumps accurate, one had to specifically define the location. Otherwise, you might just end up putting yourself in front of a flying kunai instead of behind it. Or worse, if for some reason the chosen coordinates were incompatible…there was no telling what would happen then. Maybe the user would be torn apart, or maybe they would become stuck in the bridge dimension forever, or maybe they might become wiped from existence because of some unaccounted-for dimensional anomaly.

Kakashi was many things, but suicidal was not one of them. Not after so many others had died so he could live.

The trouble was, a single fixed point of reference was impossible in a constantly changing world. One needed at least four non-coplanar points to define a single three-dimensional space. That was why the Hokage guard's transportation techniques took three people around a fourth person to work – because they were dealing with four seals at once. Meanwhile, techniques like _Kawarimi_ or _Shunshin_ didn't count because they operated with the basis that you, visually, already knew where you were going to go, in earth-dimension only.

But Minato-sensei had only used one seal to define a path of travel. What's more, he put them on mobile objects – his special kunai, for example – and always ended up in the right place even if he didn't know where they were. Which was, by all accounts, impossible.

Theoretically, someone could _create_ a centerpoint and bury it deep underground in a secret location and hope that tectonic displacements didn't change it too much, but…no. There was still too much uncertainty; too much error. Minato-sensei had been nothing but thorough. A shortcut like that wouldn't have been good enough for him. And it certainly wouldn't be good enough for Kakashi.

Thus, Kakashi was forced to conclude that there was no such thing as a perfect anchor. In any event, relying on an anchor was too dangerous. The world was constantly changing.

 _You cannot have an invariable point of reference in a universe where all motion is relative._

But how did Minato-sensei do it, then? Did he just _not_ have an origin? Kakashi certainly had never seen him use one. But how would that have worked? You _needed_ an origin! It was just flat-out impossible otherwise. Was there some secret way to teleport _without_ an origin?

No. Kakashi was crazy, and unconventional, but not _that_ crazy and unconventional. There were certain facts of life that could not be disputed. If you held a match to straw, the haystack would burn. If he ignored Gai, Gai would come and find him anyway. If his heart was ripped out, he would die. And if he didn't use an origin, he'd just get himself lost in dimensional space forever.

There had to be an origin.

There had to be a fixed reference point.

There had to be something that Kakashi was missing.

 _Think, Kakashi! What is the one thing that remains constant every time the Hiraishin is used, regardless of everything else going on around the user –_

Oh.

 _Oh._

 _God,_ he was stupid.

The one thing that remained constant every time the Hiraishin was used – it was the _user_ , of course! The _user_ himself was the fixed point of reference – hence the reason why Kakashi never saw Minato-sensei plant another one down in the earth.

And this was where it got confusing once again. How could the user – the _moving_ person – be the anchor, the one thing that had to stay _fixed_? It seemed contradictory. How did the Yondaime continuously compensate for a continuously moving origin?

 _Because he didn't._

Motion was relative. Motion was _always_ relative.

When using the Hiraishin, _you_ don't teleport to another spot on earth. _You_ stay fixed, and that spot moves up to meet _you_. It went against common sense – but when you were floating around in outer space – or, in this case, just another bridge dimension – with no other points of reference except for yourself, that was what everything would seem like. If he hung upside-down from a tree, he'd know he was upside-down because of gravity. Remove the earth, and now everyone else was upside-down, not him.

 _The_ user _is the invariable point of reference!_

No wonder it made no sense. He had been reading the whole thing with the _earth_ as his point of reference, instead of the user, this entire time.

Talk about blaming the cartographer for reading the map upside-down.

If the origin had been a separate point from the start and finish, then of course the technique would fail – you can't change both start and finish at the same time to compensate for a change in the origin's location. You can't move only one point in a triangle and call it the same triangle. The origin was always fixed by _definition_ ; the world _literally_ revolved around it.

Now _this_ was why Minato Namikaze had been hailed as a genius. It was so brilliant. So brilliant, but _oh so simple_. With just that one realization, his late teacher had solved both the problem of finding a fixed origin of reference _and_ making the origin something that could be kept track of without tampering by a third party.

Unless the user was also destroyed, taking that reference point with him, of course. But Kakashi was pretty sure that in such a situation, the lack of a Hiraishin origin marker would be the last of his worries.

Kakashi smiled triumphantly to himself.

 _Take that, Jiraiya._

And then he looked at his clock.

And his calendar.

And the stubble on his chin.

 _Shit…how long have I been working on this thing?_

* * *

 _Tanyu_

As I found out, the Butterfly was actually a title, a nickname given to Lady Arakawa's most senior member in her informant network. There had been multiple Butterflies throughout the years, but given the recent deaths, she, the current Butterfly, had been the last.

Both Lady Arakawa and the Head Secretary, gone. It had come as a surprise to both of us, really. She had not expected it to happen. Certainly not so quickly.

That she had expected it to happen at all, however, was what made me look twice at the situation.

The Daimyo's palace was still in a state of shock. Naturally, that meant gossip was everywhere – though, amazingly, none of the stories were even close. Apparently, our lockdown on all information sources was doing better than I thought it would. Meanwhile, the ANBU teams investigating the Head Secretary's murder had come back stating that the trail had gone cold a few kilometers into the Earth Country border.

Which basically told me jack all, because any competent assassin would do that if they wanted to make their story even slightly believable.

Once again, I was reminded how dangerous shinobi were in the minds of men. _Boogeymen, in the night. Ghosts, phasing through walls. And you are training to become one of these monsters._ That someone could sneak past a whole platoon of guards for multiple silent kills was something that would keep even me up at night, let alone someone without chakra. Even the most intelligent and observant people, civilian or shinobi alike, could disappear in a second.

I could could only hope that the other nations didn't take advantage of the new power vacuums to start something nasty. For all of their faults, the Head Secretary had been a very intelligent man, and with Lady Arakawa's help, they had undoubtably been an unstoppable power in the capital. They were the two pillars that held up the strength of Tanyu, and now they were gone and the Daimyo was struggling to fill the voids they left behind.

Well. With Lady Arakawa gone, leadership of her flock of chambermaids naturally passed to the Butterfly, so that was one half of the gap gone. Without a noble title or property to call her own, however, the Butterfly didn't have the protection or privileges Lady Arakawa had. If she was going to keep her head, she would need allies. Force, to go with her mind.

"Hello, shinobi-san," she said, holding up significantly better than Lady Arakawa had under the stress of interrogation. "I hope your mission is going well."

"As well as it could go," I replied. "Does the death of your mistress sadden you at all?"

She shrugged. "She did a great wrong to an innocent man. Sometimes we must accept that the people we looked up to did a bad thing. In that case we must also accept the consequences."

"You're surprisingly well-versed for a simple nameless chambermaid." From what I had gleaned about her during our cleanup sessions, she had no name. If she had been given one, she did not know it, for her parents had died before she could remember anything, and among the upper class she was only another speck of dust on the ground. She had not been important enough to have any name, other than "you there". I leaned against the wall, letting the light from the oil lamp glint against my sharpened kunai. "Let's stop dancing around each other, Butterfly. What do you want?"

She smiled. "I want a lot of things. You'll have to be more specific than that."

"Let's start with Lady Arakawa. You told her that the Head Secretary was going to turn against her. Was he really, or were you lying to cause trouble? And who was he conversing with, that made you so sure it was Konoha nin?" Ino asked.

"I would never lie to my mistress," she protested demurely. "I have served her faithfully for many years, since she was but a little girl. As for the 'who' – if you children don't know then I could hardly tell you."

"You know what I think? I think you planned this," I accused. I was guessing at this point, but it was a very logical guess. "You weren't as loyal to Lady Arakawa as she thought you were. You had your own agenda – to break the power monopoly Lady Arakawa and the Head Secretary held over the rest of Tanyu. And it worked. Too well, I'm afraid, because now they're both dead."

As Ino was still new to her family's mind-reading techniques, she couldn't shift through memories very quickly yet, and required someone else to externally prompt her targets to efficiently find the right answers. I only meant for my questioning of the Butterfly to be a blind shot, but I must have hit close to the truth because her carefully composed face twitched. Ino's mouth shot up into a smirk – she'd found something.

"Well?" I pressed.

She looked as if she wanted to continue speaking in riddles, if only to extract more information from me, but one look at my blade disabused her of that notion.

"I expected Lady Arakawa to cause trouble over it," she whispered. "I didn't plan for anyone to die. I thought, that if they both lived and started plotting against each other…"

"…They'd cover your own movements. You failed to recognize just how quickly and strongly Lady Arakawa would react to the betrayal. So where does that leave you?" I had to get the truth from her. It could mean life or death for us, depending on what she knew, and who she would tattle to. "Where are you from? Who do you work for?"

Unlike Lady Arakawa, she hadn't done anything that would legally warrant an execution. She was only following orders, and it wasn't her fault that her employer had overreacted. She hadn't killed anyone or sold state secrets.

But if she had even the slightest possibility of betraying us…I shot a glance at Jiraiya, who had the same worried look on his face. We had no excuse for killing her, not like Lady Arakawa. And yet I could strike her down right here, right now, and make it look like an accident, if I wanted. Then there would definitely be no potential witnesses left.

Of course, that would be a terrible thing to do, and no doubt Jiraiya and the other Jonin would put me on a watchlist for even suggesting it.

 _Fire country native. Born in Tanyu, and grew up poor,_ Ino told me over her mental connection. It was still weak, but considering that we were standing only a few feet apart and sharing eye contact besides, anything stronger was entirely unnecessary. Besides, she was twelve. This wasn't a matter of skill, but endurance. Only time and practice would grant her the ability to telepathically communicate over many kilometers like her father.

 _No shinobi contact?_ I asked.

 _None whatsoever._ Ino smiled. _The next Head Secretary is slated to be a more progressive man, if she gets her way. She's planning a revolution of the common people._

 _A peasant revolt?_ I couldn't believe it. That was treason, and a very stupid idea besides. They rarely worked because of a lack of training, supplies, and organization. Besides, Fire Country was already well-fed and prosperous. No one would risk their head to back one right now. It would only get put down quickly and bloodily, and do more harm than good. Not to mention, with anarchy and civil war came instability. They would devour themselves on the inside while leaving their backs exposed to the enemy. Even if they did win, they'd be facing opposition from loyalist factions – and from the neighboring countries wishing to strike them down before their own peasants got the same idea − for years on after.

 _Not a violent revolution,_ Ino corrected. _More like…a gradual shift in policy. She wants the people currently in positions of powers knocked out so she can stack them with more progressive thinkers, who would be more open to her agenda._ She sent me a list of the names of nobles that the Butterfly had anonymously assisted up to high positions in the past, many of whom were now in a direct position to fill many more recently vacated titles and offices.

And given that the Butterfly had been around this place for decades, that list was quite long.

 _She's been working her whole life for this,_ Ino told me.

To say I was impressed was an understatement. This Butterfly lady was smart – a good deal smarter than I had initially given her credit for, and I hadn't ever thought her to be stupid by a long shot. She might have gone through this completely undetected, too, had Ino not already learned her interrogation techniques. The mind-reading abilities of the Yamanaka, I decided, were just as ridiculously overpowered and unfair as the Sharingan under these circumstances – only far more subtle.

A mere chambermaid, influencing national policy. Forget killing her; this was someone I wanted on my side. A secret for a secret.

 _See anyone named Danzo Shimura in her head?_ I asked Ino.

Ino was confused, but looked anyway. _Who is that? Is he a shinobi?_

 _I'll explain later; I promise._

 _She hasn't come into contact with any shinobi. She only figured out the Head Secretary was dealing with them when she saw him reading a seal-activated note,_ Ino explained, sending me a memory. The Head Secretary, still alive, only a few days ago. He had a folded piece of paper in his hands, with random black squiggles on the outside.

I wondered what they were meant for, as they couldn't possibly hold together in a real sealing environment, before realizing that this was the Butterfly's memory, not mine. The Yamanaka technique was limited by the capabilities of their target, and human memory wasn't perfect. Her brain could only copy down what she could decipher, and since she was a civilian with little knowledge of fuinjutsu, that was what they translated to. As the Head Secretary opened the note, however, she could read the writing just fine, or what she could see from her vantage point.

 _Vote yes on proposal – wait for – [?]_

So she hadn't been lying, then – though she _had_ told the truth with deceitful intentions.

The Head Secretary in the memory closed the note, and it burnt itself. I exited Ino's mind, and returned back to the Butterfly, now with some more ideas on how to deal with her.

She was staring at the kunai in my hands apprehensively. Having felt the effects of Ino's interrogation, she knew she was caught. Even without being a Yamanaka, I knew what she was thinking now. Lady Arakawa had been dependent on one man – the Head Secretary – for survival. She had foolishly thought she could live without him, and as a result drove both of them to their graves. (That was a lesson, to pick and choose your allies carefully.) But the Butterfly wasn't dependent on anybody – rather, many people were dependent on her, now that Lady Arakawa was gone and she was managing the network.

"What are you going to do to me?" the Butterfly asked carefully.

"That depends on how much I can trust you. How do I know you're not working for someone else already?"

I knew that she wasn't, but checking twice was always a good idea. Perhaps I could glean some more about her, from her answer.

She thought about it. "If I had, I wouldn't have tried to give you that letter. You know how important that is. There are better ways to frame someone or buy their trust than give away something so important to his cause."

"And _your_ cause?" I looked at her plain uniform, her calloused hands. "The common people," I inferred. "You have dedicated your life to upsetting these nobles."

She tilted her head and stared at me silently for a good ten seconds.

"You're a scary kid, you know that?"

"I've been called worse," I said, thinking of Anko. "The point remains…I am a shinobi. I work for the Daimyo, and said nobles. These are seeds of rebellion. You could face execution for this."

Okay, not really, but always best to enter negotiations with a strong hand.

She saw through me right away. "You'd have to prove it. Me, a simple chambermaid? What could I do? I am loyal, in that I serve Fire Country and the Daimyo. If my opinion of competent people differs from others, I am entitled to that right, commoner or not. I've been doing this for decades, darling. "

Konoha's clans held on to their advantages because of secret techniques and genetics. But also, because clanless shinobi, while at a disadvantage, still had the opportunity to rank above or marry clan members by their own merit. My mother, for example, and the majority of Konoha's Jonin. Revolutions were less likely if the option of social mobility was the easier and more available path.

Oh, there was still plenty of behind-the-scenes quarrelling and backstabbing, as I knew all too well by now, but they were based on ideology and leadership debates more than class structure. The divide between nobility and the lower classes in Tanyu, however, was much more rigid. Everyone got the same basic rights in theory, at least – the days of serfdom had disappeared at the end of the Warring Clans era – but someone like the Butterfly couldn't marry up.

"That's nice. You know, shinobi share similar opinions on class structure. Our ranking system is merit-based."

Mostly.

I neglected to mention the Hyuga clan.

"Is that so?" she asked.

"Sure," said Naruto, understanding just as well as I that at this point, we needed as many contact points as we could get in Tanyu. Trained shinobi with their easily accessible records on file could only go so far. Given our starting point, the Butterfly was our best option for a point of contact. We had to get her on our side _now_ , before she decided to cast her lot in with anyone else. "We could help each other."

Because we were Konoha shinobi, and Konoha shinobi were loyal to Konoha. We didn't care about policies that went on in the capitol as long as they didn't affect us.

She narrowed her eyes at us. "How can I trust you?"

"You can't, not really. But let's face it. We already know what you've been doing, and if we wanted to turn you in or stage an 'accident' for you we'd have done it already," I explained.

"Really, we're giving you a heads-up in advance," Jiraiya said, understanding my intentions immediately. "Legally, you might be innocent, but that doesn't mean people won't try to protect their anonymity anyway."

She smiled grimly. "People like you?"

I shrugged. "People like us…or other people like us who aren't us. I promise you, we're completely in the dark about this, too. Either way, you'll have to be careful about who you reveal information to. Even if they are one hundred percent trustworthy, the mere principle of breaking the silence might be enough to call an assassin down on you. So. Either you go through this with at least a few shinobi who are willing to give you a chance…or you go through this alone."

"Fine. Deal." Her hand reached for mine, but then she warily drew it back again. "How do I know you won't betray me, like the Head Secretary tried to do with Lady Arakawa?"

I rolled my eyes. "Because I'm not an idiot, that's why. If I killed loyal allies every time they lost their 'use' like every other stupid tyrant, no one of talent would want to work with me anymore, and I'd be left with no allies."

She stared at my outstretched hands for a very long time. As in, long enough that my arm started getting tired. But I refused to drop it until I had an agreement from her.

My persistence paid off, and she took my hand with a smile. "Fine. I believe you," she said.

"And I you. We look forward to working with you. Butterfly."

* * *

 **A/N: No bonus this week, sorry.**

 **Quick poll instead: before the reveals, who did you think was responsible for the "suicide"? (I remember getting lots of Danzos, the Guard captain, the Butterfly, and a few correct with Lady Arakawa.)**

 **Also, who would win in a fight, Zabuza vs. Kisame? What about Zabuza and Haku vs. Kisame?**


	38. Let the Pieces Fall

_The Yamanaka Clan Compound_

Kakashi-sensei clapped his hands together. "So, I _was_ going to test you guys on the Bingo Book, but after all the crazy stuff that happened on your mission, I think that it's better that you guys take a little break first."

"Yes, that's much better," Ino agreed wholeheartedly.

"Now, before we go back to being all fun-and-games, we have to discuss something a little more serious at the moment," he said.

"What's that?" Naruto asked.

Kakashi-sensei rubbed his face with his hands. There were rings underneath his eyes. "…I think it's about time you guys had the 'talk'."

"What… _kind_ of talk?" I asked. "Because if it's _that_ talk – "

" – we already had it back in the Academy," Ino said. "Plus, my parents already told me all of the other stuff beyond that."

"One, I'm pretty sure _Naruto_ skipped that day, two, _no_ , it isn't _that_ talk, although thank you for reminding me because you need to have that one, too, and three – Ino, did your mother or your father talk to you about it?"

Ino raised an eyebrow. "…My mother?"

"Then you haven't had the _shinobi_ version of it yet. So," Kakashi-sensei clapped his hands together, "I'll keep it short and simple. Don't get caught with your pants around your ankles in front of an enemy. Literally and figuratively. Simple as that."

Ino rolled her eyes. "Yes, mummy."

He slapped the back of her head. "I mean it. Reality is a sad and unfair thing if you're not careful, so don't say I didn't warn you. Anyone and everyone is susceptible. It doesn't even have to involve anything physical – in fact, the more dangerous part is becoming emotionally involved with someone trained to take advantage of natural human irrationality. So be careful, and don't do anything stupid with anyone if you haven't known them for at least a year, and _both_ of you haven't gone to the local clinic to be tested for STDs and all that stuff _together_ , and − "

"Yes, mummy," we chorused.

We all got smacks that time.

What Kakashi-sensei said was sensible enough. The surprising thing was the fact that said sensible things were coming from Kakashi-sensei. I suppose it wasn't too far-fetched to imagine him using his reading material and flirting habits to cover up his actually being a closet prude, though, seeing as that particular department of Konoha's rumor mill never seemed to get anything too interesting about him in that regard. Good shinobi were always paranoid, especially the socially stunted ones, and he was probably just being hypocritically overprotective of us.

"But back to the original 'talk' that I was going to give you – you kids need a hobby or something," Kakashi-sensei sighed. "It usually – helps – with dealing with all the stuff that you've been through. Stuff that you _will_ go through."

"Humans and their highly vulnerable heads," Naruto nodded sagely.

"What do you mean as a 'hobby'?" Ino asked.

"Anything that you can use to completely encompass your mind outside of ninja life," he stated simply. "For example, the Sandaime can determine where a tobacco leaf was planted and imported from by the mere smell alone. Asuma and Kurenai like denying that they're dating. Anko eats dango. Gai – well, I'm not sure what non-training activity Gai considers to be _fun_ , outside of bothering _me_ , but it works for him. On the other hand, Tsunade is slightly more self-destructive in her gambling and drinking. Meanwhile, Jiraiya enjoys peeping on women in the hot springs, although I think he liked doing that way before his first kill anyway." He turned to look at Ino and me. "Inoichi Yamanaka likes gossiping, Shikaku Nara likes sleeping, and Orochimaru didn't really have a non-shinobi hobby, so look where that got him. Get the drift?"

Naruto scratched the back of his head. "So…what are _your_ hobbies? You never really answered us, before."

Kakashi-sensei grinned and held up his dog-eared copy of _Icha Icha_.

In the background, a large group of people suddenly began to shout loudly for no reason.

"Dismissed. I'll see you tomorrow. Take the day off. We'll be going back to D-ranks for a short while, just for you lot to get yourselves back together."

Never before had the three of us been so glad to hear "D-rank."

Naruto and Ino immediately bolted after that, but I stayed behind just a little while longer.

Kakashi-sensei cocked an eyebrow at me. "Was there something else you wanted to ask me about, Shikamaru?"

There were many things I wanted to ask Kakashi-sensei, actually. His life story, for one. But I knew that he wouldn't be handing that information out so easily.

"…Why do you start all of those arguments?" I finally decided, looking over to the still-forming crowd in the distance.

Kakashi-sensei's eyebrows shot up again. "I don't know what you're talking about."

I sighed. " _Fine_. Why do you enjoy watching people argue?"

"Why do I enjoy watching people argue?" Kakashi-sensei asked. I nodded. And then his vacant look disappeared, and it was replaced with a more somber one.

I could get used to distinguishing between his various limited facial expressions, but it still unnerved me, the way he could change attitudes so quickly.

Kakashi-sensei was silent for a short while. And then he began talking.

"Arguing is good. It helps…it helps people let off steam, without actually resorting to violence. If all of our problems could be solved by just arguing, we wouldn't need to teach five-year-olds how to throw knives in the first place. Besides, as long as people have the strength to argue, it means that they also have the strength to form – and defend – their independent opinions," Kakashi-sensei finally answered me. "And if people have the strength to form and defend their independent opinions, it means they are still living and not just alive. Even brainless zombies can live in eternal toleration of one another. So as long as you have the strength to, argue."

"Aren't there better ways to go about that, though?" I asked, looking back over at the crowd, where someone was holding up what looked like a pack of sunflower seeds. "Like…I don't know, a well-researched and civil debate, versus a silly argument over – well, silly things? It's just conflict for the sake of conflict."

Kakashi-sensei shrugged. "Yes, well, some people just aren't as linguistically gifted as you are." And then his serious face disappeared, and it was replaced almost instantaneously with his regular happy-go-lucky attitude again. "…Plus, it's funny."

* * *

 _The Hokage's Office_

"You've had an exciting mission, I take it," said Sarutobi-sensei. At least, he sounded like Sarutobi-sensei. Jiraiya was still having trouble figuring out which was which, even though he had been actively searching for the clues ever since the existence of his old mentor's…not-so-newly developed eccentricities had been brought to his attention. "And brought home a great deal of revenue, too."

Jiraiya shrugged. "All in a day's work?"

"It was good you went with those kids," said the Hokage. "I promised I'd keep Team 7 updated on whatever news we had concerning the Akatsuki, and I intend to fulfill that promise. Pass it along when you can."

"So Shikamaru was right? It was the Akatsuki, not Iwa? He's convinced that they're using it as a front to drive the villages to war. Am I being a paranoid old fool for thinking it was someone else?" Jiraiya asked carefully, neglecting to mention the children's involvement with – or even knowledge of – Danzo.

Unlike the inconveniently smart children of this generation's Team 7, Jiraiya was well-trained and well-known enough that an assassination attempt would be considered stupid by even the most reactionary of powers. At least, that was what he was hoping – that his status, as one of Konoha's best, would protect him from the worst.

It hadn't protected Sakumo, but back then Konoha had had less dead or defected talent.

"Yes, it was the Akatsuki, and yes, I'm sure," said the Hokage. "As for Danzo, do you think I'm stupid, Jiraiya? I like to keep an eye on our idiot of a Daimyo so he doesn't end up killing himself and bringing the rest of the godforsaken country down with him just because he chose to follow the wrong advice from equally stupid people! The only reason why that despicably weak, indecisive, damned little fool _hasn't_ majorly screwed up since taking office was because he was lucky enough to have one competent advisor running the show. I won't lie; Danzo has been responsible for many murders. But our dearly departed Head Secretary was not one of them."

At this shameless admission, Jiraiya felt his insides turn to lead.

The jaded adult in him was saying, _You naïve fool; did you really think we, or any other hidden village worth its name, would follow the rules set by a bunch of civilian rulers?_

But the noble child was aghast. On instinct, his mouth opened, and regurgitated the lessons his sensei had taught him when he was little. The lies upon lies, spouted out at malleable six-year-olds to regurgitate by memory, not because they wanted them to grow up to be honorable and noble warriors, but because a deluded sense of comradery was the best way to keep a large population of trained backstabbers and liars in line.

"Konoha isn't supposed to – " he stuttered plaintively.

" – Danzo is not Konoha," the Sandaime said curtly.

"But we still – "

"It was not out of any selfishness or cruelty, I assure you," the Sandaime snapped. "Conspiracies had nothing to do with it. The Head Secretary was a brilliant man who kept the country together while the Daimyo and his wife chased cats and sipped tea in their rose gardens. But he could not have done it without our help."

Jiraiya tried again. "Lady Arakawa showed me that note!" He omitted the part about _how_ she showed them that note – that is, through Ino's memory gathering – and pressed on. "Don't you understand that this position you so carelessly handed off to Danzo was being _used_ to bribe the Head Secretary to make him the next Hokage – "

"You think I didn't know that? He's a civilian, not stupid. The only difference between him and any regular ninja is the ability to perform jutsu. And that goes for a great deal of people living in the court of Tanyu. Their loyalties are only as steady as what practically suits them. You think Danzo was the only person bribing him?" The Hokage finished off the dregs of his pipe. "He is rich enough not to depend on 'external donations'. Someone in his position is not _bribed_ , merely selling his attention span in a bidding war. At the end of the day he does what he so chooses."

"And who else is bribing him? Obviously, not you, the clean face of Konoha."

"The richer clans, obviously. A few foreigners, mostly merchants looking for lowered customs duties. Some special-interest groups that are in no way comprised of our ANBU. The usual. It's not just Danzo. But I let him run his little bribing ring so I can see what he's up to."

"And he, in turn, you."

"Well, that goes without being said."

Jiraiya was furious. "I didn't think you were a gambling man, sensei. How could you just let this happen? You're playing a futile waiting game, letting an already powerful man with dubious allegiances grab more power. Whose side are you even on? Your own? Because every time you claim to hate Danzo, you turn around and let things that would work to _his_ advantage slide."

The Hokage shrugged. "The men in Tanyu honestly don't care about us. As long as the Hokage is some impressive-sounding S-rank nin they've heard of before, they'll confirm him. The official blessing of a few men a thousand miles away won't mean anything if… _If Shikaku Nara has his way,_ "Hiruzen Sarutobi seemed to murmur under his breath, so quiet Jiraiya almost missed it.

 _I've always hated these damn riddles of yours, ever since I was a Genin,_ Jiraiya thought. _Shikaku Nara; can't you people just give it to me straight?_

"I'm not Hokage material, and I mean it. I can plan a fight, or even a campaign. But that's about all I can do, and Tsunade is only slightly better than I am," Jiraiya said. "Still, I will do what I can. For Konoha."

"We seem to lack in options," the Sandaime mused. "Kakashi…even before that thing with Orochimaru happened, I hesitated."

"Good thing you did, otherwise Konoha might not have been left standing," Jiraiya quipped.

Hiruzen Sarutobi smiled. "If we're lucky, the entire shinobi system might collapse with it." His face turned somber. "All jokes aside, however…if we forced duty on him, he would do it, and do it well, for every second of every day, regardless of how miserable it would make him. He would make himself the perfect Hokage, like he makes himself the perfect machine, and…sometimes perfection is not always the best."

Jiraiya frowned. "Are we artists or shinobi?"

"A good ruler will recognize that he can _never_ be perfect. He is limited by his own human nature. He must know when to wear the public face, and when to be selfish and relax. Otherwise he will tear himself apart," the Hokage explained. "What's the point of a golden age if the man behind it burns out before his thirtieth birthday?"

Both of them chose to ignore the ticking clock still stamped on Kakashi's shoulder.

"Tell me, Jiraiya – if you had a large bag of sweets, would you hand it over to a sugar addict who you knew would eat himself sick?"

"No."

"No. That is not only an unwise waste of your candy, but it is also unethical. It is just so. I cannot, in good conscience, force this job on someone who will only hurt himself doing it, who has sacrificed so much for this village already."

"I know Naruto had dreams of being Hokage, but he won't be mature enough for a long time yet. Shikamaru, though…I can see it happening," Jiraiya mentioned. "He's got his teacher's spark, his father's calm, and his mother's spirit. He's had a happy childhood, a stable family, and good friends who will hopefully keep him grounded if he flies too far. He's not so far gone, and I daresay he would _like_ this shit, though hopefully he'll learn to be smart enough to not like it _too_ much. We could make it work."

The Hokage. "Perhaps. Perhaps we could. There is a certain charisma about Shikaku's boy. He's not as vivacious as either of his teammates, but a steady forcefulness exists in his calm."

"He's a fast thinker, acts professionally, and clearly has the ability to care about other people, given how he acted with his friends. I didn't notice any of the usual, what-do-you-call-it, _darkness_ that appears in people like Orochimaru," Jiraiya added, recalling what he could from his time spent working with the boy.

"Good, good. Of course, there is always the off chance that he's just frightfully good at hiding it, but then that would mean he'd have to fool both you and his father. He might be clever, but I don't think he's quite _that_ clever," the Hokage chuckled, and Jiraiya had to agree. "I think he would prefer background work more, though. The truly intelligent would never stand in the very front, but one step behind, for it allows them to observe two steps ahead."

There was some silence as the Hokage tapped out the remains of his tobacco into his ashtray and exchanged the with some fresh leaves.

"Do the children know?" the Hokage suddenly asked him.

"No," Jiraiya lied. "I thought it would be best they did not get mixed up in this. At least, not yet. Even if they were smart enough to understand, I didn't want to make them a target."

He made sure his face betrayed nothing, even as his heart beat its way out of his chest. For a second he thought he might have been caught.

But the Hokage only closed his eyes and nodded in relief. "Good."

 _Even the best and brightest will believe what they desperately hope is true._

Jiraiya coughed. "Anyway. You are sure? It's the Akatsuki?"

"I am sure. You might blame Danzo, and they might blame Iwa, but it is their work, definitely. The Head Secretary's death was not advantageous to any of us. Though he had many enemies, he did a good job of maintaining the state of things in such a way that his death would cause his killers greater trouble than his continued life. But," he shrugged sadly, "even the best men can be taken apart by someone with more spite than reason. Danzo and I are both logical. The Akatsuki, and Lady Arakawa, less so. Well, the die has now been cast, and Tanyu is left vulnerable at a time we can ill afford it."

"Have you told Kakashi?" Jiraiya asked.

"We'll tell him as soon as he wakes up," the Hokage said. At Jiraiya's concerned expression, he smiled. "He's not hurt; don't worry. He's just…sleeping off a bit of excitement. And by 'excitement' I mean he hasn't slept since you left for Tanyu. Something to do with that side-project we gave him."

Jiraiya felt the glee crawl onto his face. "Really? How far along is he? Did he start crying in frustration like I did yet? Has he suffered, like I suffered?"

He could just imagine all the pain and misery he wanted to see on Kakashi's face – all the dark nights and sleepless hours – the pain, the utter defeat, the _dammit I give up Minato you arse_ −

The Sandaime shrugged. "He claims he's finished."

− all the pain and misery –

− all the –

− _what_ −

What.

" _WHAT?_ "

"That's what he says."

"That's impossible! I refuse to believe it!"

"I don't know; he was explaining things to me pretty well when I questioned him about it." The Sandaime put a hand on his chin. "Even if he was half-delirious from lack of sleep."

Jiraiya sank into a chair and crosssed his arms. "That's not fucking fair."

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

My post-mission conversation with my father was not going as well as I hoped.

"I thought I told you to stay out of this," he said coldly.

"It's not like I went looking for him!" I argued heatedly. "Danzo's left behind bits and pieces of himself everywhere; I'd have less luck _avoiding_ him. In fact, being in the know is possibly the _only_ way I'd be able to stay out of his way."

I understood why my father was acting this way. I truly did. His reason was the same one that motivated Jiraiya to cover up our involvement in the matter.

But he couldn't shield me forever.

"The most powerful noble in the Daimyo's court was entering his employ when we got there," I told him, "meaning many other lesser powers are probably already taken as well."

My father let out a shaky sigh. It was one of worry, but not surprise. He must have already expected Danzo to try something of this nature. "Truly?"

"Truly," I confirmed. "In the official reports, the Head Secretary was assassinated by either Iwa or the Akatsuki disguised as Iwa, but off the books, Jiraiya and I think Danzo killed him."

My father smiled. "You're smart, Shikamaru. Too smart. And sometimes, too smart means you're wrong."

"…What?"

"A surprising double inversion, actually. You drew a dangerous conclusion, and so you covered it up with the next most logical step. Turns out, your accusation of Danzo was the lie, derived from too much information, and in fact the story you made up was the truth. The Akatsuki were responsible without doubt."

" _What._ "

"I'm not messing with you. We promised we'd tell you about anything we knew about the Akatsuki. At this very moment, Jiraiya and Inoichi are briefing Naruto and Ino. The Hokage's direct sources say that the Akatsuki are trying to start a war between Konoha and Iwa, with the hope of dragging in Kumo as well."

"Then what about Danzo? What about the bribes, and − "

"From what Inoichi managed to glean, Danzo was as annoyed as the rest of us. After all, he did so much work to win over the Head Secretary, and now the man is dead." His smile grew wider at my growing shock.

I sank down into my chair and threw up my hands in disgust. "First Lord Isayama's obvious murder by the Head Secretary turns out to be a suicide all along. Then the Head Secretary's obvious murder by Danzo turns out to be the Akatsuki all along. How do you expect any reasonable human being to wade through that many fucking layers of deception?"

My father's anger was now completely gone, replaced by total amusement. "But it wasn't deception. The truth wasn't complicated at all. It was right in front of your face. But your natural paranoia and logic compelled you to dismiss the too-obvious solution," my father said, and I felt like a five-year-old again, listening to his seemingly infinite wisdom like a bedtime story. "Most of the time, you would be right. Look underneath the underneath. But sometimes, even the underneath is the lie. Sometimes, it really _is_ just that easy."

"How can _you_ tell?" I asked.

"I didn't," he said. "That's the worst part. You can never really know for sure. The state of the world is a difficult thing. People are easy enough to play and read, because they are right there in front of you. The most unpredictable madmen have some pattern to them. But so many different factors affect the state of the universe, factors that you can't measure or reach. Even I wouldn't have been able to see through that. Not without Inoichi's and Jiraiya's confirmation."

I noticed he left the Hokage out of that.

"Life would be simpler if I was omniscient," I muttered to myself.

"Would it?" my father asked, upon hearing my little declaration. "Don't be too sure."

"You're right," I sighed. If there was one thing more maddening than knowing that you didn't know something, it was being unable to do anything about what you did know. Omniscience would be nothing more than a recipe for madness, if it didn't come with omnipotence.

But omnipotence, too, had its dangers. Too much power caused madness, same as not enough power. Men were not meant to be gods.

Even though I really, really wished I could be.

My father patted my shoulder. "Don't be so hard on yourself. It was a reasonable mistake, and by all means, an amusing one that would not have changed anything. The current Head Secretary is still dead, the next one will still be targeted by Danzo, and both Iwa and Akatsuki would have found their excuses sooner or later."

"He wants to become Hokage," I said.

My father snorted. "So does your friend Naruto. People want a lot of things. Doesn't mean they'll get them."

I looked up at him. "What do _you_ want?"

"Easy," he said. "For Danzo to _not_ get what he wants."

"And do you think you'll get what you want?"

He shrugged. "My will against his. We'll see who's stronger."

That night, I went to sleep, still amazed at how much muck something as stupid as Lady Arakawa's half-baked plan to oppose the Head Secretary ended up revealing.

 _And to think I was so confident I could have finally pinned this one on Danzo,_ I thought angrily.

Even after the deaths of three different people, nothing had changed. The current Head Secretary was dead, the next one would still be open to Danzo's bribes, and tensions with both the Akatsuki and Iwa would remain high. My father kept vaguely talking about how he was going to take down Danzo, but as far as I was concerned he didn't have any pieces in that major battleground at all.

 _But he does have one._

 _You._

* * *

BONUS #32

A chart summarizing the Tanyu arc has been posted on the forum.

* * *

 **A/N: Side projects are important for people in stressful situations to take their mind off things. What are your suggestions for kid ninjas?**


	39. The Rite of Spring

BONUS #33

 _New fanart and webpage available! All links are consolidated at:_

 _sites [period] google [dotcom] /view/boomvroomshroom_

 _(This page is also accessible from my profile.)_

* * *

 _Jiraiya's "Office"_

To Jiraiya's great chagrin, the Hokage had been speaking the truth when he informed him that Kakashi was finished reworking the Hiraishin. Any victory he had to concede to Kakashi was physically and emotionally painful. The Hiraishin most of all. It was, of course, not an "ultimate" technique – there was no such thing – but if there was, the Hiraishin would be it. Apart from a few other basic close-up insta-death ninjutsu, this was the one hallmark achievement that Minato had relied on the most.

He'd even rewritten everything in distinctly legible handwriting, far different from his usual seagull crap (because calling it chicken scratches implied that he could write more neatly than something with webbed feet). It was easy to forget the ridiculously obsessive-compulsive sort of person Kakashi had been as a preteen, down to his pristine mission reports, in favor of the…ah, _unforgettable_ , personality he wore in the present. But moments like these, where he truly gave a damn, showed that the rimrod soldier hadn't completely died yet.

"You've got to be kidding me," Jiraiya groaned.

Kakashi shrugged.

"How long did this take you?"

Kakashi shrugged.

"Do you know how many _years_ I spent on this, kid?"

Kakashi shrugged. "…None?"

Jiraiya paused as he considered that. "All right, true enough." He had looked at it once, decided he had better things to do than _math_ , and shoved it out of sight and mind. He glanced over the energy calculations. He had no way to prove if those numbers were right, but they sure as hell made a lot more sense than the ones he'd ended up with when he'd taken a stab at Minato's work.

"It was tricky, but not as hard as it looked."

"True." Kakashi's explanations had been so beautiful in their clarity and simplicity that they might have belonged in a textbook. "If only you'd write mission reports just as cleanly."

"But see, you understand it now, don't you? That means you could have done it if you sat down and properly concentrated on it," Kakashi said diplomatically, then added cheekily, "But you didn't, _sucker_!"

"You know what? Screw you. Screw you, and all of your weird-ass coordinate math, and these dimensional transformations – just – screw you!"

Kakashi gave him a very dubious once-over, and said, "I'm flattered, but no thanks."

"Do you _want_ me to sew your mouth shut?" Jiraiya threw a book at him. "Get the hell out of here."

"But I still haven't tested it yet!" Kakashi protested. "I need a spotter, preferably one with a fully functional chakra system and sealing experience! What if I disappear into the null void forever?"

Jiraiya shrugged. "That's your problem, not mine."

"You know what? I think you're secretly praying for that to happen."

"Oh, gee, how could you tell?"

* * *

 _Training Ground 38_

"You owe me for this, Kakashi," Jiraiya grumbled. "So? Get on with it."

"I'm not even asking you to do anything that difficult," Kakashi pointed out.

"Yes, but I'm still taking a large chunk of my precious time out of my day to babysit you and make sure that you don't end up killing yourself because you forgot a minus sign somewhere," Jiraiya replied dryly.

"So am I cleared?" Kakashi asked.

"Yep, you're cleared. Start whenever you're ready."

Kakashi nodded, and set the first seal on the ground with his toe. One of the world's most dangerous and useful techniques, being rediscovered through his feet.

And to think people dismissed full-body chakra circulation as a basic control exercise, only applicable in the field with basic skills like tree-climbing and water-walking.

"Now or never," he muttered.

He sparked the seal with chakra.

For a moment, Kakashi felt weightless, like he was falling.

And just like that, there he was. He had appeared exactly where he wanted to be…

"Well, I'll be damned," Jiraiya whistled. "You actually did it."

…Just not in the position he wanted to be in.

(There was a huge difference between landing on your feet, upright and ready for any attack, and flat on your back, completely winded.)

"Apart from the whole 'falling on your ass' thing," Jiraiya amended with a laugh, "but yeah, you did it. How about that."

On one hand, that was good because it meant that his integrations had been on point, but on the other hand, that meant that his lack of coordination had nothing to do with his own issues (which were easily fixed) and everything to do with the inherent setup of any technique associated with instantaneous teleportation (which was probably impossible to fix). Unless there was a higher dimension that was somehow more comfortable than the one he was currently using as a conduit.

But then it would probably be less predictable and safe. It was the classic tradeoff between utility and comfort, and when it came to a technique as risky as this, utility was the only option. If a moment of nothingness was the price to pay for _the_ ideal universe of zero friction and zero gravity, then so be it.

"You okay, brat?"

Kakashi managed a grim smile, and then he let out a weak cough through his mask before rolling over onto his knees.

"I'm fine. Ready for the next jump."

…Right after he caught his breath.

He wouldn't have been so excited during the development period of this technique if he had known from the start how user-unfriendly it was. Gingerly, he got up to his feet, his head still spinning. That was another real-world issue with this technique that he couldn't possibly have understood had he just kept it theoretical.

Since he had regarded himself as the point of reference for the moving world, he was technically motionless throughout the entire process – however, he had forgotten to mentally account for the motion of everything _else_ during the jump. Unfortunately, falling onto the earth, as was the normal case for injuries in the real world, was nothing compared to the earth falling onto _you_ , which was exactly what his dimension-brain was perceiving to happen every time he called upon the Hiraishin.

Because even though it was obvious that he had moved ten paces to an outside observer, to him, he hadn't actually moved at all. Kakashi had anticipated velocity and momentum where there was none, where every distance was zero and directions didn't exist.

No middle ground, no room for error, and therefore no extra time for preparation or mental adjustment. It all went by so _fast_ that his mind didn't actually catch up to where he was going until after he had already arrived. Mentally, he understood that. But getting his body to cooperate was a different matter entirely. Ever since he could walk, he had been heavily trained in his coordination, and now he had to deal with something that ran completely counter-intuitively to how his muscles had been trained.

Recalibrating twenty-six years' worth of instinct didn't happen in a single day.

 _Step._

 _Fall._

Ground.

 _Step._

 _Fall._

Ground.

Then there was the matter of reconciling earth-time with Hiraishin-time, which was just as difficult as his changed spatial cognition, if not more. Movement was instantaneous, and yet time was not truly zero, otherwise he'd be able to be in multiple places at once.

But that was impossible. There were certain laws that could not be violated. One could make clones – two clearly separate pieces of matter – and have them occupy two clearly separate states. But even with the Hiraishin, the same person – or the same object, in general, as in the same mass and volume, with its corresponding atoms and particles – could not span across two different states at once.

So time was not zero; time was a value that was infinitely small, approaching zero and yet not quite there. The time passed in the Hiraishin-dimension was a limit, easily representable on paper with pretty abstract symbols, but impossible to visualize in real life. The human brain just wasn't designed to comprehend the ideas of nonexistence and infinity.

"Stop it!" Jiraiya snapped.

"What?"

"Stop _thinking_ so much. Seriously, I can hear you all the way from here. You did all the thinking when it came to calculating your seals. Now trust in your own work and let it happen."

"Stop _thinking_?"

"Trust me," Jiraiya said. "I saw Minato going through the same stuff you're experiencing now. The more you think about it, the more senseless and confusing it gets, and the more stressful it becomes for you."

Stop thinking? Please. You might as well tell Shikamaru to stop scheming. "I don't wanna."

"Fine, then. I'm not going to clean up after you if your brain ends up melting out of your ears."

Kakashi let out a long breath and tried to keep from retching. At least he managed to land on his feet this time, but it was still disorienting. No wonder Minato-sensei looked like hell when he first started.

Jiraiya had never bothered to learn the mechanics behind the Hiraishin no Jutsu, but he had been there for the testing process for Minato-sensei, just like he was here for Kakashi now.

Which only meant one thing.

 _He knew._

"You planned this, didn't you?" Kakashi growled, dry heaving into the grass.

"Your fault for trying to use the Hiraishin. This is your punishment," Jiraiya shrugged, quite unsympathetically.

"You were the one who gave it to me in the first place."

"You didn't have to take it."

"You basically implied that I would never be a shinobi again, or teach my kids, or have a life if I didn't do this. And you outright stated that it was a direct order from the Hokage, to learn this."

"Oh. Oops."

There was a great deal of schadenfreude in Jiraiya's seemingly calm, nonchalant expression – one that expressed extreme satisfaction after finally seeing the one person responsible for his years and years of uncalled-for suffering get what he deserved.

He had absolutely no idea where Jiraiya got those negative sentiments.

Kakashi sighed. "All right, let's try this again."

"You sure?" Jiraiya asked skeptically, seeing through him immediately. Hey, the man might be a perverted buffoon most of the time (the two of them really _were_ a pair of peas in a pod), but he wasn't a renowned shinobi for nothing. "You look like shit."

"I feel like I've just been swallowed by another dimension, only to have it vomit me back up again," he groaned. "Oh, wait – that's because that's actually what just happened."

"If it makes you feel any better, Minato didn't stop crying until after a month of nonstop practice," Jiraiya commented. "You're already further ahead than he was, you fucking nerd."

Kakashi shivered. Normally, learning new techniques brought him joy, but he wasn't looking forward to this one at all. "I remember he kept fake-coughing and pretending he was sick with some persistent flu. I wasn't fooled; I knew he was making excuses for something, but I didn't know what for."

And to think that he had been extolling the virtues about how beautiful and simple the damn thing was just a short while ago. Turned out the technique was beautiful and simple from the pespective of everything except for the user himself.

"Get up," Jiraiya ordered, toeing him with his boot.

"Bwuh," Kakashi mumbled into the grass.

"No, no, _no_! I am _not_ carrying you home!" Jiraiya snarled. "You are a grown man, Kakashi; you carry yourself home! And don't pull the chakra exhaustion shit on me; the Hiraishin barely ate into your reserves!"

"Bwuh," Kakashi repeated, and fixed his eyes on Jiraiya plaintively.

Jiraiya held out for about five seconds longer before he capitulated. "Fuck you, Kakashi."

Kakashi rolled over to his side. "I win."

"Remind me, why am I keeping you alive again?" Jiraiya groaned exaggeratedly. Kakashi responded by sinking down a little bit further, and reveled in Jiraiya's frustrated curse. Both of them knew that he wasn't _that_ heavy – Jiraiya had thrown far heavier things much further – but their odd little relationship just wouldn't be the same if Jiraiya didn't complain at every little thing Kakashi did to him, deliberate or not.

"Because you love me so much," Kakashi drawled, crashing on his couch, mainly because Jiraiya had unceremoniously dumped him there. "Thanks for the free ride home."

Jiraiya gave him the one-fingered salute and slammed the door behind him.

* * *

 _Training Ground 3_

"YOU'RE LATE!" Naruto yelled.

"What's your excuse this time?" Shikamaru sighed.

"He _gets_ no excuses!" Ino snapped furiously. "He can freaking _teleport_ now, so therefore he gets _NO EXCUSES!_ "

Kakashi grinned to himself. "What excuse? I'm not late."

"Yes you are!"

"No I'm not."

"Yes you are!"

"No I'm not."

"Yes!"

"No."

"Yes!"

"No."

"It's _nine_! You said you'd meet us at _seven_!"

Oh, was that the time already? Kids grew up so fast these days.

He didn't have a lame excuse ready, because his excuse was legitimate this time. Yesterday's Hiraishin practice had caused him to wake up today with a pounding headache, and he couldn't go crawling to Jiraiya or Tsunade for help because he'd already used up his irritation quota for the month. Except Kakashi wouldn't ever be caught dead actually giving an excuse that made sense for once. So, instead, he decided to be a little unpredictable today – well, more unpredictable than usual – and _not_ have an excuse at all.

"A ninja is never late, nor is he ever early; he arrives precisely when he means to," he answered.

"I have a feeling you stole that from somewhere," Shikamaru rubbed his chin.

"No I didn't."

"Yes you did."

"Did not."

"Did too."

"Let's just agree to disagree."

Kakashi narrowed his eyes. "You're boring."

"I'd rather be doing something worthwhile than stand here and argue pointlessly with you, sensei," Shikamaru drawled.

"D-rank D-rank D-rank please please please please let it be another D-rank," Naruto chanted.

"In fact, I _do_ have a D-rank for you – " Kakashi grinned.

"YES!"

"One which _I_ requested personally myself," Kakashi finished. "Because ninjas need their chores done, too."

The transition on Naruto's facial expression from jubilant to horrified happened so quickly that Kakashi almost didn't catch it. His students were learning so quickly. One day, they'd be able to switch from silly to serious as fast as he did. And then they could go around screwing with _everyone's_ minds, all together, like one big dysfunctional happy messed-up family.

It would be absolutely _splendid._

"…what are we doing, sensei?" Ino asked him carefully.

"Spring cleaning!" Kakashi grinned.

"But it's not even _spring_."

"It is too."

"Is not."

"Is too."

"Is not – "

"Guys, if Kakashi-sensei says it's spring, it's fucking spring, because no amount of arguing is going to convince him otherwise," Shikamaru interrupted.

" _Finally_ , someone gets it!" Kakashi chirped. "I've been trying to convince Asuma that I have a secret power to change the seasons for _ages_. For some reason he never seems to buy it."

Shikamaru groaned. "Yeah, yeah, sensei, where are we going?"

Kakashi pouted, but decided to let it go all the same. Just for revenge, though, he decided to take the longest and most inefficient path to their destination – and given how many library map missions he had sent them on in their early Genin days, he was pretty sure that they knew he was leading them in circles on purpose, too. It was a testament to how much they had improved in the patience department since they had first arrived at his feet all that time ago. Once upon a time, they would have been complaining two minutes in. Now, they just skipped along right behind him and pretended that everything was going just as planned.

Of course, they still yelled at him for being late, but he had been told many times that someone like him was capable of making even the Buddha lose his temper.

(And, if he didn't, then that just meant that Kakashi wasn't trying hard enough.)

"Kakashi-sensei," they had once asked him when he had pulled something similar to this a long, long time ago, "how much longer until the end?"

He had responded with, "I cannot predict the future, but death will come when it comes – oh, you meant until we get to our client's house? We're almost there." That was how shinobi went through life, wasn't it? Just skip along, grit your teeth and deal with whatever was thrown at you, and wait for it to end, right?

Kakashi ignored her. "We're here~!" he stopped abruptly and gestured to the building with a flourish.

Well. To call it a building might be giving it too much credit. Buildings, after all, were supposed to stand upright.

"What _is_ this?" Naruto asked.

"It's my _house_ ," Kakashi said proudly. "Kind of," he added, as a belated afterthought.

As if to prove his point, a rusty drainpipe disattached itself from the side of the building and went crashing down on the sidewalk.

"How did this even _happen_?" Naruto asked, eyes growing wide in morbid fascination as he looked at the disheveled piece of property in front of them.

"I refuse to believe this is your _house_ ," Shikamaru told him.

The skepticism was understandable. To call it a hovel would have been a compliment, because that would imply that it was at least still in livable condition, if just barely. "Sorry to disappoint, but it _is_ mine. But in my defense, the last owner paid _me_ to take it off his hands."

"Obviously, because this thing doesn't comply with any health or building standards, and it would take you more money to fix it up than destroy it," Shikamaru pointed out. "I don't know if that's supposed to be a window, or just a big hole in the wall."

Ino shook her head. "You're not planning to _live_ here, are you?"

"Of course not!" Kakashi told her, affronted. "I own multiple places scattered around Konoha and buy and sell them on a regular basis, so that certain annoying eternal rivals of mine have a harder time trying to find out where I sleep – not that it helps," Kakashi muttered darkly. "I swear to god, he has a radar for me and _only_ me. It's his sixth sense…"

"Ummm…sensei?" Naruto asked, tugging on his sleeve. Seriously, that kid was just so adorable and – _short_. For now. He was starting to get taller alarmingly quickly already. Kakashi decided to savor this moment while it lasted. People rarely remained the same after their they finished their growth spurts. Though – Minato-sensei had never been particularly tall, and neither had Kushina…so maybe Naruto wouldn't get taller than him, after all. Especially if he kept eating ramen all the time instead of proper food.

"Hmm? Sorry, what?" he asked lazily.

"You were saying, about you having lots of houses that you moved around in?"

"Ah. Yes. That!" Kakashi clapped his hands together. "So, um, I own lots of different places, and just bounce around and pick one at random to sleep in each night. And no, we won't be going to any of them; Maito Gai is already one person too many who knows where I live…"

"And you want us to clean this one up?" Shikamaru asked. "We might as well burn it down and get Yamato to grow a new house from scratch."

"Yeah, about that," Kakashi said, "some of the stuff in there is mine. So no, you can't burn it down until you've moved all of the stuff out."

" _Some?_ How much is _some_?" Ino demanded.

"…All?" Kakashi admitted.

"So you tossed so much junk in this thing that the previous owner ended up having to pay you to take it off his hands?"

"No, he paid me first, and _then_ I dumped my things in it," Kakashi explained. "And it's not junk."

"Kakashi-sensei, if I see something I like that you don't want anymore, can I keep it?" Naruto asked. "I want a junk collection, too!"

"One, it's _not_ a junk collection – these are _highly valuable artifacts_ ," Kakashi lied through his teeth, "and _two_ , I was _going_ to let you keep some stuff, but now that you're going around calling my precious belongings _junk_ , I _might_ just change my mind – "

"I'm sorry, sensei!"

"You better be."

"When you say you dumped your junk in it – " Shikamaru began.

"It's not junk!"

Shikamaru rolled his eyes. "Fine, your gar _bage_. Did you put it there like this, or did your storage scrolls explode because you overstuffed them, and now you want us to crawl through this wreckage to find what's left of your seals?"

 _Fuck, why does he have to be so smart?_ Kakashi wondered, surreptitiously turning his feet inward to hide the inkstains and chakra burns on his toes. "I call upon my right to remain silent."

"Sensei, I think you might have a hoarding problem," Ino told him.

"I do not."

"The entire place is collapsing through the ground, the room is so overfilled that you can visibly see the wood buckling, there's rolls of wire peeking out from every possible crevice, and I swear I just saw a piece of – something – sprout five legs and scurry across the dirt, which, by the way, is caked with rust."

"Well, you know what they say: a journey of a thousand junk piles begins with a single can," Kakashi responded in all of his infinite wisdom.

"Okay, that I'm _sure_ you stole from somewhere else," Shikamaru snorted.

"Did not."

"Did too."

"Did not."

"Whatever."

"I think that's enough disrespectful chitchat from you," Kakashi said, slapping Shikamaru in the back of his head. "Get to work."

Naruto groaned and walked up to wrench open the door – only to get a bucket of water dumped on his head.

"Okay, that I swear I did not plan," Kakashi lied – again. Glaring, Naruto gingerly lifted the bucket of water off his head – and a cascade of all the random things Kakashi had stored inside his oversized closet exploded outwards on top of him like a tsunami, spilling out into the street and carrying Naruto with him. Ino and Shikamaru each dove to the sides to escape the storm, and from where he was standing, he could see Naruto's head and feet turning cartwheels inside the wave of stolen – er, permanently borrowed without permission – goods.

"Okay, _that_ I swear I did not plan," Kakashi said, somewhat truthfully. He had designed this place with the expectation that any potential intruder would be buried under his mound of various semi-useless belongings. He just hadn't expected _that_ many – ahem – valuable collectibles – to have built up over the years.

Apparently, he had more forgotten buried trash than he realized.

"Liar," Naruto gasped hoarsely from where he was buried in the junk.

"What?" Kakashi asked, as Shikamaru and Ino went over to help their teammate out from the rubble. "I'm a _shinobi_. This is _my_ stuff, inside a not-so-good area of the city. Of _course_ I would have booby-trapped it. That should teach you not go go running headfirst into something without checking your surroundings."

"How many other booby traps are there?" Shikamaru asked warily.

"I don't remember," Kakashi shrugged.

"You liar. A good shinobi always remembers his own traps. And don't you dare try to tell us you're not a good shinobi."

"But I'm not a good shinobi. I'm an _amazing_ shinobi. And sometimes, there's not enough room in my brain for all of my amazing-ness, so I have to delete some information…like where all my traps are…"

" _Sensei…_ "

"Fine. I _do_ know where they all are," Kakashi admitted. "But – I'm not telling you. Consider this a training exercise."

"Sensei!"

Apart from that first incident with Naruto, however, the day proceeded relatively smoothly. Team 7 found and disabled most of his traps quite quickly. Of course, those traps were pretty elementary, to be honest, since they were only designed against civilian thieves and weren't protecting anything _that_ important – but still impressive, nonetheless.

The funnier part was what they found once they got in there.

"Are these…Baggie Babies?" Shikamaru asked, peering at the tags.

"The whole set. Including the knockoffs."

"You spent your money on these?"

"No. I _collected_ them."

"You mean you stole them."

"No, I _collected_ them. _After_ they went out of style, and everyone started throwing them out by the dozens."

"Do you want this case of bricks, too?" one of Naruto's clones asked. He held up the box, aided by five other clones, and as he did, one of them fell out and smashed against the pavement. "They're not even good building quality."

"They're not even properly baked bricks," Shikamaru said, poking at the remains of the broken brick. "They're just dried-up squares of mud and dirt. And why the hell do you have a giant statue of the Thousand-Handed Bodhisattva in here? Where did you even get it? Why would you ever think it would be useful?"

"Sensei, why do you have a sealing scroll filled with ten thousand rocks?" Ino asked, holding up a sealing scroll filled with ten thousand rocks.

"That, my cute student, is because I like sealing scrolls filled with ten thousand rocks," Kakashi answered her, and put them in his pockets – the one with the storage seal, of course; he wasn't going to waste his energy carrying around a sack of that stuff. (Every ninja worth his salt had at the very least rudimentary storage seals in his pockets – where else would they pull their unlimited supplies of kunai and shuriken and ninja wire from?)

"And _why_ would you ever keep a sealing scroll filled with ten thousand rocks?"

Kakashi shrugged. "Ummm…"

She put her hands on her hips. "You don't know, do you?"

"The first rule to being unpredictable is: if you don't know what you're doing, then the enemy won't, either," Kakashi told her, eyes as wide and innocent as possible.

"How did you even get all this stuff _here_ without anyone noticing? What _purpose_ does any of this serve?" Shikamaru ranted.

"Hey! Keep working! You're not done yet!" Kakashi ordered them.

"Slave driver," Naruto muttered. "You're flipping insane, you know that?"

Well, of course. Every great man was thought to be insane, until he changed the world.

(And some never changed the world. They were just insane.)

"Sensei, what's this?" Ino said, opening a large box, and immediately a flurry of colorful silk cloth spilled out. She held the folds up to the light. "Are these all kimono?"

"Whoa!"

Ino gasped in delight, and began thumbing through the contents of the box. "They're so amazing! There's got to be at least twenty in here! And they're so well-made and _intricate_! These could have only come from the great cities! This is top-of-the-line stuff! Where'd you get them all? And – wait a minute, all these obi are cut for women. Why do you even have them? You weren't planning to give these to some secret girlfriend of yours, were you? They must have cost a fortune – unless you stole them – " She stopped short in horror.

"Ino? What's wrong?"

Ino said nothing. She simply pointed at the last kimono at the very end of the box, stony-faced. Shikamaru and Naruto followed her gaze, and they, too, stopped short. Curious, Kakashi turned to see what had them silenced so. It was just a box full of kimono; nothing too special about it. The particular one that Ino was pointing at was light blue in color, with leafy flower patterns –

Oh.

 _Oh._

"You – _you…_ " Shikamaru whispered.

Kakashi scratched the back of his head sheepishly. "Oh. Right. _That…_ ummm…"

"IT _WAS_ YOU!"

"Look, guys – "

"I can't believe I said…" Naruto howled in anguish. "SAKURA-CHAAAANNN!"

* * *

 **A/N: It's funny because the box implies he's done it before.**

 **Thanks for being patient, guys. Still consolidating the next arc, so hope you enjoyed this fun chapter in the meantime.**

 **On the bright side, I just finished with finals. Probably failed them all, but still, I finished. Which means more writing, to distract me from my impending doom that is grades...**


	40. Smelling Fishy

BONUS #34

[wwwdot] fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/158541967/1/Bonus-34-Ch-32-Extra-Scene#158541967

* * *

 _Training Ground 3_

"You're late!" Kakashi-sensei called out cheerfully.

Ino stared at him.

And then, despite all of their training and experience, their team exploded at him.

"OH, AND _YOU'RE_ NEVER LATE?"

"EXCUSE ME, BUT LOOK WHO'S TALKING!"

"AND YOU SAID THE MEETING TIME WAS THREE! IT'S THREE RIGHT NOW!"

"For your information, it is _not_ three, it's 1500 hours," Kakashi-sensei grinned. " _Gosh_ , I know _I'm_ really bad at being on time, but my personal record was four hours. _Twelve hours late_ , kids. That's a new low, even by my standards." He looked away and rubbed his chin. "Then again, that only means I'm teaching you properly. I always knew you would surpass me one day, but not this soon – "

"You can't seriously expect us to meet out here at three in the morning!" Ino yelled.

"You never know when there might be a sneak attack at three in the morning," Kakashi-sensei pointed out. "Now, as your sensei, I have an obligation to ask you why you're late."

 _Well, if you're going to play this game, then we're playing, too._ "A mass pandemic was falsely reported," Ino said.

"I thought the apocalypse was coming," Shikamaru added.

"And also, there was a mosquito in my shower," Naruto declared.

The three of them nodded vigorously in agreement, somehow all in sync despite not being mentally linked and having never previously coordinated their story. It was a bit creepy, really, how much time they spent with each other.

"A mosquito?" Kakashi-sensei asked, interested. "Was it big and scary?"

"Yeah."

"It was really big."

"And scary."

"It was really big and scary, and super hairy."

"A disgusting, bloodsucking monster with a proboscis big enough to rival the swords of the Seven Swordsmen and enough malaria to wipe out a micronation."

Kakashi-sensei frowned. "I'm not a medic, so I can't say for sure, but I don't think microbe counts work that way – "

"But the point is, it was huge. Like, the size of a dinner plate."

" _Bigger_ than that. It was the size of a person."

"The size of a house."

"The size of the Hokage Tower."

"The size of the Hokage _Mountain_."

Kakashi-sensei raised an eyebrow. "…I think I would have seen a mosquito the size of the Hokage Mountain, guys."

"It was invisible. We only knew it was there because it's a magical mosquito that only becomes visible right before it tries to eat you," Ino explained.

"Oh! Well, that makes complete sense." Kakashi-sensei rubbed his chin. "Mosquitos are a serious menace indeed. I wouldn't have believed you if you said it was a spider, since I've trained you better than that, but mosquitos are something to be feared."

"Of course not," said Naruto. "Spiders are our friends. They eat mosquitoes."

"Giant mosquitoes would also explain the pandemic warning," said Ino.

"And pandemics are tied to apocalypses," said Shikamaru.

Kakashi-sensei nodded. "Giant, bloodsucking, parasitic insects. Are you sure it wasn't a lawyer?"

Naruto looked at his toes. "It might have been."

"There, there," Kakashi-sensei said, patting his head. "You were very brave, and some might argue that the lawyer was worse. Well, since you guys fought a giant man-eating invisible mosquito and lived, I suppose I should tell you that Sasuke Uchiha was last seen in the company of the daughter of the weapons shop owner's nephew. Meanwhile, the weapons shop owner's nephew is plotting to kill this new intruder, Sharingan or not. In case you wanted to know."

"Wait, wait, wait, I have to write this down!" Ino called out, scribbling furiously on a notepad.

"If you're looking for juicy dirt on people, Ino, you might want these," Kakashi-sensei said, pulling a filing cabinet's worth of notebook paper out of nowhere. Ino grinned like her birthday had come early, as did Naruto.

In the edge of her vision, she saw Shikamaru's eye twitch. _Score._

"Naruto, please don't tell me you're obsessed with all this dating business, too," he groaned, like he was a boring person. Which he totally was.

"Hey, people pay for this shit, and I need ramen money! Ino told me if my clones helped her spy on people, she'd give me a cut of the profits," Naruto defended himself. "And it's not _entirely_ dating business. It's other news, too. Like, the places people like to visit regularly, where Madame Shijimi's sugar bowl was last seen, and how many men the Fire Daimyo's wife's other cousin – the one that's a total party animal, not Lady Arakawa − got drunk and seduced at the last New Year's banquet hosted by the Fire Daimyo. Ino says the answer is seven, by the way."

"Ugh, mental images!" Shikamaru groaned, physically wincing. Despite this, he looked extremely interested – and also extremely mad at himself for looking extremely interested. "How come _I_ was never told about this?"

"We only came up with this idea like yesterday, and you weren't there because you were busy training with your dad or something! You were supposed to be the database host, since, you know, you're smart. I'm going to be the actual writer – that is, I'm the one dealing with the tabloid publishers face-to-face and charging them outrageous prices for the gossip they want, because I can read faces really well now. And Naruto, of course, is the field worker, because of all those clones. I'm planning to rope all of our other friends into this operation, too. We were going to tell you about the entire setup today, but then Kakashi-sensei distracted us when he asked us about Tora." Ino kept scribbling in her notebook. "It's all Kakashi-sensei's fault. It's always Kakashi-sensei's fault. Right, Kakashi-sensei?"

"You know, I think I'll leave now," Kakashi-sensei said.

Ino stepped in front of his path, and Naruto grabbed his arm. "What do you mean, you're _leaving_? We haven't interrogated you yet!"

"All the more reason for me to get out of here. What are you going to ask me, anyway? You know that all the scandalous things I do are already displayed to the public on a regular basis."

 _Of course it is. Because everything about his public act is completely deliberate, and you can't ruin a reputation that you never had to begin with_ , she thought. _But there has to be something he isn't telling us._ "Oh, really? Are you sure about that?"

"Perfectly sure. I normally don't give out this information freely, but since you're my cute little student, here's a tip for you. If you want to make money from tabloids, you need to write about things that people will be _surprised_ to read about," Kakashi-sensei pointed out. "Now, if you'll excuse me – "

Shikamaru pinched the bridge of his nose. "What they _meant_ to say was, you never told us why you called for a team meeting. I'm guessing we have a mission? One suited to our rank, this time, because our little D-rank vacation has gone on for long enough."

Kakashi paused in the middle of prying Naruto's surprisingly flexible fingers off his sleeve. "It's a B-rank in Wave Country. We leave in a week. Since Shikamaru was the designated team leader last time, I'm making Ino the team leader this time. Naruto, you'll get to be the team leader on our next B-rank, whenever that is. Now, on paper, the mission itself is some minor pickpocket business, so it's supposed to be a C-rank, but due to the location…"

Ino lifted an eyebrow. "It's been quite a long time. Is Wave still that dangerous?"

"Nothing is absolute. Wave _should_ be fairly stable by now, otherwise I wouldn't have agreed to this mission, but better safe than sorry," Kakashi-sensei said.

"I suppose, compared to the other foreign countries, Wave isn't half-bad. At least the locals have a reason to like Konoha nin," Shikamaru said.

Of all the B-ranks to get, this one was fairly decent. They couldn't hang around cleaning out Kakashi-sensei's sheds forever. Or, technically, they could, still being officially Genin and all, but in reality, they were two clan heirs and a jinchuuriki under the command of a guy who invited murderers just by opening his snarky little mouth – they weren't going to get much of a break simply by pretending to be the usual cannon-fodder Genin. Anyone in their positions would have to take some risks if they wanted to improve their skill level beyond that of those who wanted them dead.

 _It's not as if there's any chance in hell they're sending a team with two blondes into Iwa territory,_ Ino thought. _And even if we dyed our hair, now that Kakashi-sensei can use the Hiraishin no Jutsu, having our team anywhere near Earth Country would be a declaration of war._ In the Academy she had always thought the historical context lessons were boring and stupid, like any other kid whose name wasn't Sakura Haruno, but being on Team 7 made her think twice about it.

Nothing left to do but hold her breath and hope things worked out.

"What about Kumogakure?" Naruto mentioned. "I remember that other time we were talking about how they were trying to take advantage of the power vacuum in Wave, but I haven't heard much about them since then. What do you think they could be up to?"

 _Kumogakure, huh?_

 _Trust Naruto to bring that up the moment I was wondering about it myself._

If there was one thing she could count on Naruto for, it was asking the right questions. He was not the most knowledgeable person (not yet) and sometimes he still had trouble figuring out how to act in certain situations, but he was naturally good at understanding what he _didn't_ know and figuring out what information was important to him.

 _Knowing what you don't know is as equally important as the things you do know,_ Shikamaru's father always told them.

She was no longer surprised at Naruto's not-so-rare-anymore moments of perception – events that were steadily becoming more and more common since they graduated from the Academy. He'd proven to them time and time again that he wasn't as stupid as he acted. As a kid, he was hotheaded because that was the only way he could get attention. In Team 7, however, there was no Sasuke to show up, no Sakura to impress, no Iruka-sensei to bother. And so it had only been a short matter of time before he learned that thinking was more impressive than deliberately putting himself in danger.

"That's a good question," Kakashi-sensei said. "I don't know. I'm sure they're still planning something – all the villages are, ours included. But it might not necessarily be Wave."

"What if they sense that we're pulling out of Wave, so they send people back to cause more trouble?" Naruto asked.

"They could," said Shikamaru. "It's unlikely, though. Wave is much closer to Konoha than it is to Kumo, and there are more efficient areas to contest with Konoha than this one."

"Doesn't hurt to keep on your toes, though," Kakashi-sensei added. "As a personal rule, always be on the lookout for foreign nin, no matter the situation or the easiness of the mission."

"So it's not the regular bandit removal, then," Ino inferred. "Wave might look peaceful now, but it remains the next best place to scout out opposition, short of a direct border confrontation with another country. At our level, it's inevitable that our missions involve observing foreign influences, but because of our age, you didn't want us to deal with the direct consequences of another powerful enemy village."

Kakashi-sensei smiled behind his mask. "I believe the term is 'political petri dish'."

"Makes sense. Ino made me read this book yesterday, and I don't remember most of it, but I remember it said somewhere that Kumo has always been good at keeping conflict off their home turf," Naruto pointed out, shooting a sidelong glance at Shikamaru for confirmation. "That means the best place to figure out what they're up to is outside of their village, not in it, right?"

If Kakashi-sensei could get any happier, Ino thought he might explode. "Yes," he said, ruffling Naruto's hair, "you're absolutely right."

* * *

 _Jiraiya's House, later that night_

"Naruto's asleep, so be quiet," Jiraiya said lowly.

Kakashi snorted dismissively. "I've been on missions with Naruto; a train wreck wouldn't wake him up." But he kept the volume down anyway, out of habit, if nothing else. His entire life was defined by his being a shinobi; what others considered a stealth crawl was how he regularly conducted himself. Of course, most ninja were the same, Jiraiya included; Kakashi simply took it a step over, like he normally did.

It wasn't exactly his fault that he started way too early. That was how Sakumo had taught him to walk, since the day he took his first baby steps, the closest learned thing to instinct he had. It was as natural to him as any mother tongue, the language of war, and to be honest, making noise like "normal" people probably required more conscious effort for him than not.

Kakashi accepted the tea Jiraiya provided wordlessly.

"He finished the third tail today, and is now halfway through the fourth," Jiraiya admitted. "He's far more talented than the Academy gave him credit for."

"Let's hope he keeps learning this quickly. Even then it might not be enough," Kakashi said. "There are only nine jinchuuriki in the world to worry about, and for whatever dumb reason they have, the Akatsuki want all of them. They won't be giving up so easily, and I don't know if I can fool them again with that bait-and-switch."

Kakashi had left his mask pooled around his chin. Jiraiya was one of the few people on earth who was allowed this treatment. Jiraiya didn't know why, and Kakashi wasn't very forthcoming with details either.

 _He's young_ , Jiraiya decided, _too young_. They all were. You wouldn't be able to tell normally, not with his personal file of combat experience three tomes thick. But where most people only saw a cunning, confident veteran, a man of Jiraiya's age could notice wide, dark, frightened eyes, too large for his thin face.

Kakashi had been an adult since the day he found his father with his own prized tanto through his belly, and yet he was still, in many ways, very much a child.

"We can hold them off, I think," Jiraiya reassured him. "By the time they come back, Naruto will be ready. Hopefully."

"That might not be enough," Kakashi said darkly. "I want to kill them. For what they did to Shikamaru, for what they want to do to Naruto." He laughed. "Thank the gods I have Ino; I don't know what I'd do without her."

Well, before that, Kakashi would summon his dogs every time things got too bad. But even that was denied to him now. Yes, thank the gods indeed that Ino Yamanaka was there to keep the balancing act, otherwise Kakashi would surely –

− Jiraiya didn't know. Kakashi was very unlike the Uchiha boy in that regard, despite their similar upbringing (or lack thereof). He and Shikamaru Nara were two peas in a pod. They could be resentful, indignant, cold – but never self-destructive anger. When faced with cruelty they did not react; they retreated. Turned themselves into perfect logical blocks of steel so that nothing could hurt them again.

"I should get going," Kakashi said. "We have a B-rank to prepare for."

Jiraiya twitched uneasily.

"What?" Kakashi asked.

"Nothing."

"It's not nothing. Don't lie to me."

Jiraiy grumbled. "The Hokage still doesn't know if he should send you out into the field yet."

"Oh, did he now?"

"You didn't hear it from me. Look, chances are it doesn't mean anything. At the worst he'll send another observer along, maybe Yamato − "

But of course Kakashi was already gone. 'Chance' was never on his side on the best of days, and sanity hadn't been in his possession for a very long time.

* * *

 _The Hokage's Office_

"Kakashi, what are you doing here?"

The bigger question was _how_ he kept managing to sneak past all the desk Chunin and ANBU, but at this point the Sandaime no longer cared because it wasn't going to keep him out either way. Asking him for his purpose usually made things go by faster.

Then Hiruzen looked up, and realized he was better off not knowing.

* * *

 _The Land of Waves_

Jiraiya hadn't been able to come with them on this mission. He was busy with other stuff for the village. Considering how much time Kakashi-sensei had been spending with him in the days leading up to the mission, it must have had to do with either the cool teleportation thingy or Orochimaru. Naruto liked having the old man around, even if he was a complete perv, but no one could replace Kakashi-sensei. Who was also, he supposed, a perv, though not so overt about it.

Yamato had been sent as the designated Jonin observer instead. At first, Naruto thought it was because of him and the Kyuubi, but then it turned out Kakashi-sensei still needed a minder. In fact, Kakashi-sensei hadn't been supposed to come with them at all, because even though Kakashi-sensei was clearly capable of freaking _teleporting_ , he hadn't completely mastered it Yondaime-level yet, and until he did, it was something Konoha was trying to keep under wraps.

But naturally, Kakashi-sensei had pitched a fit until they let him come with Team 7, where "pitching a fit" meant leaving verbally abusive post-it notes all over the office coffee machines until the Hokage finally gave in.

"So, Tenzou," Kakashi-sensei began.

"It's Yamato now."

" – or whatever your name is at the moment – "

"It's _Yamato_."

" – You know, you were more adorable when you were too little to correct everything I said."

"We met when you were fourteen!"

"And you were eleven. You hadn't started puberty, and I was almost done. You were the size of a large mushroom, and I was a few centimeters away from my current height. Quid pro quo, you were little." Kakashi-sensei gave him a dubious glance. "Still little."

"Isn't it supposed to be Q.E.D.?" Yamato muttered.

"Same difference."

Naruto was honestly overjoyed that Kakashi-sensei was _back_ and Team 7 was Team 7 again, if you could ignore Yamato. It wasn't that Naruto ddn't like Yamato – after all, the guy had trained Naruto for the Chunin exams, and was one of the few people Naruto considered a true friend (separate, of course, from the regular friends, who he picked up basically anywhere).

But he was really missing the days when it was only the four of them. When Kakashi-sensei was still normal-ish, enough that they could be trusted on a mission alone, without someone else peeking in. He wanted to chase Tora through the Forest of Death once more, to guard jumpy merchants through the deserts of Wind Country, to run across the waters all the way to Uzushiogakure and back again. To go to the time from before the Chunin exams, before everything went to shit.

So far, though, the mission was progressing smoothly. Maybe slightly slower than optimal since Kakashi-sensei had to stop and find good points for setting Hiraishin seals every so often, but that wasn't a big deal.

"This place looks really nice," Naruto said, taking in the beaches. They were rocky in some areas, and the early morning fog still hadn't cleared off completely yet, but the land was less gloomy and more peaceful. "I bet they're making loads of money off tourism."

"Loads, but poverty remains a large issue in this place," said Ino. "There are still a few pickpocketing rings and petty thieves to be rounded up even if Konoha has mostly cleared out the rest of Gato's thugs."

Petty thieves and pickpockets. Violent crime sounded more in Gato's style, so Naruto suspected these were regular Wave citizens that resorted to stealing when Gato's policies prevented them from making money the honest way. The more people stole, the less people worked, and thus the less total produce there was available, and thus the more people stole.

It was a vicious cycle that they were slowly getting out of. This was why, as simple as it was, this mission was important. Apart from fishing, Wave's developing economy was dependent on tourists, trade, and foreign currency. If foreigners were too scared to come, they would be losing out on a great deal of that started capital they so desperately needed to get things back to normal.

"Yeah, well, that's why we're here. Clean up the streets, lock away some thugs, help old ladies cross the street, blah blah blah." Naruto sniffed the air. "The most successful pickpockets like to work in teams, similar to us. At least one for the distraction, and one for the actual stealing. The most common trick is to pretend to be lost," he remembered absentmindedly. "They also like to dress up as tourists and go around asking for directions. Large maps are great for distractions and blocking off vision. Then there's also the cute little kid who lost his parents, the old lady who can't read…basically something involving another person needing help. Sometimes they come up to some random person, crying, and tell them their brother or whatever needs help – when said brother is really a bigger thug waiting in an abandoned alleyway with a brick or a nailed-up board or a knife – "

Naruto suddenly realized he was rambling and cut himself off. He shoved his hands in his pockets and stared at the ground. "Not that I ever did any of that," he mumbled.

No, he hadn't, but he had seen it happen and done nothing. Or, he'd tried to do something, but only ended up making the situation worse. This was when he was still living on the wrong side of the tracks, and hadn't graduated from the Academy yet. Muggings weren't entirely common in ninja villages, since the entire place was a full-time walking military police force, but the civilian criminals that managed to evade arrest were cleverer than normal. Konoha was a big place. Some things flew under the radar.

But it wasn't as if Shikamaru and Ino needed to know any of this. This wasn't their first mission involving organized crime. Hell, there were at least four instances where they had posed as criminals themselves. Naruto, as far as he was concerned, was still the best at breaking into stuff, but his teammates were more than well-versed in the same.

"No, no, it's fine, Naruto," Ino broke in. "It's good to have a recap so we're all on the same page. We need to coordinate the best way we're going to target these guys. The mission is simple, but we all know even the easiest things have the potential to go wrong in the worst possible way. And that knowledge was very helpful."

"So what's the plan?"

"The simplest one would be the usual easy-target trick," said Ino. "We dress up as some dumb tourist, let ourselves get robbed, and then follow the guy back to his little hideout."

"Sounds reasonable," Kakashi-sensei agreed. "Now the important part is determining what the details will be."

"I thought about that too," Ino said, unfolding a map. "Naruto, Shikamaru, and I already asked around for the local crime reports. Seems like the majority of them take place in this area – not a surprise, because it's a popular location for wealthy foreigners to visit. If we could spike some of our money with something that can be easily tracked, we'll be able to follow them back to wherever they're hiding…I have a few basic ideas on how we might be able to trap them all, but I don't want to create a set-in-stone plan until we know exactly what the layout of their environment is like."

Naruto really, _really_ wanted to suggest a Hiraishin tag because _hells yeah, those things were so cool!_ However, he managed to restrain himself, because he knew that idea wasn't as great as it seemed on first glance. Kakashi-sensei could only teleport himself; transporting another passenger required multiple people, like in the Hokage Guard Platoon. Having a team mission was pointless if only one person could arrive at the right location.

Tracking devices would cause a similar problem. Any electronic could be seen, dumped, lost, and so on. It had to be something that could be hidden directly on the money. Something that could be absorbed by the paper, like…a scent.

"Blood would be the easiest to smell, but also too suspicious. Something as simple as a pet dog in their hideout could end up revealing our plans," Shikamaru pointed out. "We need something else. It has to have a pungent and unique enough smell for us to be able to track it, but it also has to be mundane enough that no one would ask questions if they saw some stained money."

The easiest thing to do would be to make Kakashi-sensei do the tracking work for them. Even without his nin-dogs, the man had an absolutely godly sense of smell. But then they wouldn't be practicing their skills as much as they could be. Naruto, as the best tracker of the three of them, needed to think of something that could work for him. He was decent, but he couldn't pick out one man in a city of a million people with only a used tissue as reference.

Would perfume work? Possibly. But they hadn't brought any perfume with them, and it didn't look like Wave was selling any of that yet. They'd barely gotten t-shirt stores and keychain depots set up. Perhaps there were local drugstores with strong herbal medicines that didn't evaporate quickly. Or…

Naruto spotted a brightly colored sign out of the corner of his eye.

"Um," Naruto raised his hand, "that food stand is selling really pungent seafood ramen."

Shikamaru turned to see where Naruto was pointing.

"Naruto?"

"Yeah?"

"You're a fucking genius."

* * *

 **A/N: Thank you to everyone who has reviewed so far. That being said – in no way am I complaining about the** _ **number**_ **(seriously, you guys are the absolute best)** **– I'd love some feedback about the direction this story is going in. Especially if you are the type of reader who normally keeps quiet because you don't want to be mean. I'm afraid my writing hasn't been up to par during my time at school and I don't want this to be one of those "starts off good and then flops" stories.**


	41. Troubling New Developments

_Konoha Central Hospital_

Once again, Sasuke cursed. Why did Hinata have to intern in a HOSPITAL of all places? He hated children. And sick people. And people in general. And, because of his horrible experience with the prepubescent monsters in the Academy (excluding Hinata), _girls_ –

He choked as a nurse in a _really_ short skirt walked by.

– behaviorally (and, uh, physically) mature _women_ with better things to do than chase after him, however, were an entirely different matter.

"She put the clan head in the hospital, and neither of them are talking to each other right now."

"Sorry, what?" Sasuke asked the mini-female-Neji. Choji did a discreet sign language dance. _Hinata's sister._ "Oh, uh. I mean. Hiashi Hyuga? Hospitalized? She never told us that."

Choji put his face in his palm.

"I mean, yes. She did?" Sasuke tried again, desperately glancing at Choji for hints.

"The clan hushed it all up, but I thought you should know, as her teammate, since she's not the type to brag," said Hanabi, gracefully ignoring his flubs. "We were supposed to spar, to determine the clan heir issue once and for all, and well…"

Sasuke stared at Hanabi's blank forehead, and paled. Hinata had bangs, so he never had the chance to see, but _what if –_

"No, she doesn't have the seal," Hanabi said quickly. "Father said whoever got knocked out first got the seal, so she turned around and punched Father in the face and knocked _him_ out, so now neither of us have a seal."

Sasuke's sigh of relief was choked in the middle by Choji's massive peal of laughter. "That's just _gold_! Sasuke! This could be a new friend for you! I mean – sorry. Of course we'll take you to see Hinata."

"Thanks," said Hanabi, pushing past Sasuke. "And…um, can you not mention this to anybody? We're still supposed to be pretending that she doesn't exist, to shame her for 'abandoning the clan' and 'being a traitor' and all that stupid bull that the clan elders are feeding us, as if anyone believes it, but…she's still my sister, and I still want to talk to her, because…I mean, all the times we've sparred, she could have beaten me, but didn't…and it's thanks to her that I don't have the Caged Bird seal yet – and I really miss her. And when things used to be so simple, and we were just like regular sisters."

"Siblings aren't supposed to fight," Sasuke agreed, and he, too, found himself wishing for simpler times, when Itachi _wasn't_ a batshit insane murdering torturing psychopath. _Was he once a normal person, driven mad by the expectations of the clan and the village? Or was he like that all along, and he was just pretending to be the perfect son, heir, and brother – and I was just too dumb to know better?_

 _Had any of it been real?_

He didn't know what hurt more. That Itachi had never loved him in the first place and was just pretending to be normal, like psychopaths did (which was sad in its own way), or that Itachi had chosen his current path because his hate and insanity had outweighed said love (meaning despite everything he'd given Itachi, it _hadn't been enough_ ).

"We used to be so close, and then Father pit us against each other on purpose. As the younger sibling I was doomed to end up in a branch house when I became older, so defeating Hinata in spars made me feel self-important," Hanabi confessed. "More than that, though, it made me feel hopeful. Hopeful, that I'd get to lead the Main House instead of Hinata. Hopeful, that I'd defeat my fate. Now, all I can think about is how bad I feel for letting our father push us apart."

Sasuke digested this a bit. For all that his father had tried to pit Sasuke against – well, that train of thought wasn't going anywhere, but the point was, Hiashi Hyuga seemed to have tried the same things with his daughters as Fugaku Uchiha had with his sons. A little bit of friendly sibling competition, so that each would strive to do his or her best. The problem was, neither one of the two clan heads seemed to know the meaning of the word "friendly"…or "siblings"…

Despite all that, Hanabi still seemed to be a nice enough girl who looked up to her older sister, just like Sasuke had been with Itachi before Itachi decided to snap and go kill everybody for whatever reason. Maybe Fugaku and the rest of the clan had dripped on his head way too much? Sasuke knew that Itachi had been under a lot of pressure since he was small – it was why he had been forced to rush through the Academy, to join ANBU at an age before most kids graduated from the Academy, to never make any mistakes, _ever_.

"If only I could be like you," Sasuke muttered. He wondered where his torturing, murdering brother had gone. Things would never be the same in the Hyuga clan, but at least there still _was_ a Hyuga clan. Contrary to what the Hyuga clan elders might say, she had committed no crimes.

Sasuke admired Hanabi for her ability to remain true to her sibling despite the odds. _We were like that, once,_ Sasuke thought. _Itachi was the pride and heir of the clan. I was only the spare, the second son. I never let that stop me, though. I hated him, for what he did, for what he put me through, but never once did I resent him for being better at everything. Better trained, better liked. A little jealous, sure, but that was more disappointment in myself for not being as good than anger at Itachi for being better._

He hadn't liked being second, but he had accepted it, because it was indisputably true. Where others in his position might have schemed to take what belonged to their brothers for themselves – history was ripe full of stories of the evil uncle, the envious younger brother – he would have been content to give Itachi everything he had in the world.

In the end he never had to resort to any treachery to ruin his older brother; Itachi had done that well enough himself.

Hanabi was in different position, though. Up until now, Hinata was the disappointing sibling. Hanabi was genuinely "more deserving" to be the heir, and yet was doomed to a life of servitude because of an unfortunate order of birth. She had, of course, jumped at the chance to escape that fate when Hiashi Hyuga gave her the opportunity, but Sasuke wouldn't hold that against her because any sane person would do the same. That she could do so, and still hold compassion for her sister, the _cause_ of the succession crisis, was…

Sasuke suddenly realized that he respected Hanabi after meeting her for all of five minutes. It had taken him _months_ to warm up to Asuma-sensei and Hinata and Choji.

His team must have made him soft; that was the only explanation.

"Shikamaru always hated prophecies and fate," Choji mused. "At first, I thought it was because he was a control freak, which is still true. But it makes sense. I mean, if fate was real, then what's the point of free will? We might as well sit around and let the future come to us, if nothing we do will change the outcome."

"Shikamaru?" Hanabi asked.

"My friend. One of our classmates."

"I think I've heard his name before," Hanabi mentioned. "The smart one, right?"

Choji grinned. "Oh, you have no idea."

Sasuke felt a weird stab of jealousy, except he had no idea where it came from, because it certainly had nothing to do with Shikamaru. Other people had called Shikamaru smart in front of him, and Sasuke was totally fine with that because it was the truth.

 _Shut up; it's just Hinata's kid sister. Think of something else. Something smarter._

 _Like Itachi, and the clan system. There we go._

He just hadn't realized how much the pressure had affected Itachi. From Sasuke's point of view, Itachi had only ever been this perfect human being that lived up to those impossible standards against all odds, and who never made mistakes because he was the type of person who never made mistakes, not because he was afraid of backlash from his own family should he even step one toe out of line accidentally. Itachi always seemed like the type of person who treaded silently out of habit. Sasuke supposed, now, that the reality was that he only walked quietly because his entire path was lined with eggshells, put there by The Clan itself.

That didn't make his actions any less unforgivable. But Hinata had been in a similar boat here. Except that she hadn't gone and murdered her whole entire clan. Just punched her own father in the face and ran away from home.

But she could have easily been an Itachi Number Two, if her skills were that of an elite ANBU instead of just another normal Genin (albeit, one with a really mean right hook). You wouldn't think that about Hinata – she was always so sweet and shy and quiet – but then again, Itachi had been the "best big brother in the whole wide world" at one point in time, too.

"Father fed into that hope, always hinting that if Hinata didn't beat me soon she'd be the one with the Caged Bird seal on her forehead, not me," Hanabi continued. "Maybe that was why Hinata never won. Because the moment I lost to her, I'd be the one branded with the seal. Maybe Hinata kept losing, because she was hoping, too. Hoping that by the time she finally beat me, she'd be old enough to take control of the clan, and change up the system."

Sasuke still hated Itachi, but he wasn't so blind anymore. All the more reason to stay away from his brother; revenge would do nothing if he was going after a madman who was so far gone he wouldn't even understand anyone else's feelings. Whatever Sasuke did to him…even if he killed him…it would mean nothing. He couldn't imagine getting a rise out of someone like Itachi, even with all the spite in the world.

 _I don't want Itachi's death,_ Sasuke realized. _I want his remorse. Justice means nothing if the judged is executed without understanding their wrongdoing._

"And what about you? Will you?" Sasuke asked.

"Well…" Hanabi looked down, and when her face came back up there was a determination there that hadn't been present before. "I suppose I will. No matter who becomes clan head, things have got to change."

"Sasuke, Tsunade, and I all agree that the Hyuga clan needs to change" said Choji. "It starts with you and your sister."

"Really?" Hanabi asked, beaming.

"Yes," Sasuke said, even though they had never agreed to anything of the sort. Though, now that Choji had put it out there, he wasn't going to contradict him.

"That's great," Hanabi said. "I thought I was the only one, but if three other great clans can back me up, then what my family's doing has got to be wrong. Do you think the Aburame also…?"

"Hanabi, everyone in Konoha would agree that forcing two sisters to fight each other with the threat that the loser will be subjected to basically slavery for the rest of their life is a pretty messed up thing to do," Choji said, stopping in front of the door to Tsunade's mini-lab.

 _Baby steps,_ he sighed to himself.

"Sasuke?" Choji asked. "Aren't you coming?"

"I, ah, thought we should let Hanabi talk to her sister alone," Sasuke said. "You know, if they wanted to talk about family stuff in private."

 _And also because Tsunade scares the crap out of me. I swear, she makes all of her nurses talk to me on purpose, just to see me squirm._

It didn't help that his growth patterns had left him currently about eye level with her _seriously_ intimidating rack.

 _As in, that shit can't possibly be REAL._

"That's a _great_ idea," Tsunade said, stepping outside. She gave Hanabi a pat on the shoulder. "Go on in, sweetie. I'll stay here with Sasuke-kun."

Sasuke paled. "On second thought, I just remembered I have to water my pet rock − "

"I'll do it for you; all of your stuff is at my house anyway," Choji interrupted, like a filthy traitor, because he was a _filthy traitor_ , the filthy traitor. "Tsunade-sama, Sasuke has always wanted a tour of the hospital, so…"

"Choji, you FILTHY TRAITOR!" Sasuke screamed, over the sound of Choji's evil laughter.

* * *

 _Wave Country_

We were technically qualified to do this, being de facto Chunin, but that didn't stop me being nervous. It _was_ a B-rank in a foreign nation, after all. Given the way our last B-rank had derailed, I was wondering just how spectacularly this one would go.

For all the trouble Lady Arakawa had given us, I considered Tanyu a good mission. Too bad they were so rare. Izumo could pass them my way if they came up, he couldn't make them materialize out of thin air.

At least Konoha had been extremely successful in installing a pro-Fire Country regime in Wave. Not that I was complaining about preferential treatment, but at the same time, I felt I was taking advantage of the space left behind by a man I had personally done nothing to remove. Konoha had simply been in the right place at the right time when Gato was killed.

Although, we _did_ deserve _some_ credit for staying to clean up his mess. Certainly, the living standards of Wave had risen, now that they were being ruled by a bunch of people who actually knew how to handle money instead of a criminal who tried to keep it all for himself.

"Are you sure you can take this, young man?" the cook asked. "Even among ramen lovers, it might be too strong."

I bit back a grin. At least _one_ of us was enjoying his time here better than me.

"No way I'm backing down!" Naruto yelled back. "There isn't a single bowl of ramen I wouldn't love! Unless it's made wrong, but then it wouldn't be ramen!"

"You won't have to worry about that," said the cook. "We make the ramen right at the stand, so we know exactly what goes inside of it."

"It smells more fermented fish than ramen," Kakashi-sensei muttered, covering his nose at the newly-arrived meal. Naruto, ever-fearless when it came to matters of his bottomless stomach, went right in for a large bite, undeterred by the pungent odor.

"Smell, schmell!" Naruto grinned. "It tastes good!"

We were lucky enough to have arrived here at an optimal time. Long enough after their initial intrusion that the boiling pot had simmered down, but still close enough that they hadn't had the time to attempt a second attack. Kumogakure's foreign policy favored backstabbing over attacking, and money-saving above all. Unlike Iwa, and probably Suna now, they didn't outright _hate_ us. Their "let's go screw over village X" sentiment was neutrally distributed.

 _Iwa might attack us if they thought they had a good chance of winning. They learned from the last war, though; they won't be going into another war with us without an ally. Iwa claims to have better soldiers – which they very well might – but Konoha surpasses all the other villages in raw population. Our success lies in our ability to replenish our losses, as well as our ideal of minimizing loss in the first place._

Suna also hated us, and maybe would get their revenge sometime. The danger would be if they teamed up with Iwa. That, however, was highly unlikely. The history of bad blood between Earth and Wind composed of border disputes that stretched back far longer than this fairly recent spat. Meanwhile, I doubted even Kirigakure knew what Kirigakure was up to. That meant our main danger at the moment was an alliance between Iwa and Kumo.

But ever since that little trick Iwa had pulled against Kiri at Yosuga Pass, no one was willing to ally with them for anything anymore. Iwa was too smart to attack Konoha alone, and Kumo was too smart to go to war with Iwa as its only ally.

 _Basically the only thing keeping us from a war right now is that Kumo distrusts Iwa far more than they want to see us dead._

"Truly, you're a work of nature," Ino muttered, according to our improvised script. "And hey, watch it! You're getting your stinky fish broth all over my wallet!"

Naruto responded by slurping his noodles even more loudly. "Sorry."

Ino rolled her eyes in probably-not-faked disgust and dropped her wallet into a plastic bag. "You owe me a new one when we get home."

"Oh, please. I'm the one who can smell it, not you," Naruto hissed under his breath. He slammed the empty bowl down and tossed some money onto the counter. "Thanks for the meal!"

"Work of nature, indeed," the cook muttered incredulously. "Even Wave natives sometimes have trouble with this delicacy."

We spent the rest of the afternoon following Ino around into the most expensive stores and gift shops. Price-wise, they were middling-level compared to Konoha, which had a much higher cost of living, but in comparison to where Wave used to be, this was the height of luxury.

Finally, at five in the afternoon, a young, well-dressed couple bumped into Ino from behind. "Sorry, darling!" the woman gasped. "We didn't see you!"

"Oh, no, the camera," the man muttered. "The lens must have popped off when I dropped it."

I had to give Ino credit where it was due. She wasted no time putting on her innocent little girl act, and turned her back to them, leaving her purse obviously open and in there reach. "Do you need help finding it, sir? It can't have rolled far!"

If I hadn't been trained to notice these things, I might have missed it. It happened so fast, even by shinobi standards. The young couple spotted the camera lens, and right as Ino volunteered to get it for them, a shabby young man with a yellow scarf barrelled past us and snatched Ino's purse out of her hands. Screams of "Stop, thief!" followed for a few seconds, and then the boy jumped a fence, dropping the purse as he did so.

No doubt the highly distinctive scarf would also be found in a trash can not too far off.

"He took my wallet!" Ino wailed, digging through her now-empty bag prompting a large group of sympathetic bystanders to offer their condolences to "that poor little girl". As expected, in the confusion, the cute couple that had bumped into Ino before had disappeared.

"What a poser," Naruto whispered to me.

"I heard that!"

* * *

Compared to Kakashi's, Naruto's sense of smell was not as keen when it came to general scent identification, but when it came to ramen, he was accurate to the point of scary – and he wasn't even an Inuzuka. _Maybe he has a sixth sense for ramen, like Gai has for me._

It was this nose that led them to a little mountainside hut on the southern, undeveloped half of Wave. Also, lucky them, the breeze was always on their side today.

Well, lucky for Naruto. And by luck, Kakashi meant Naruto's control over his Wind-style ninjutsu was as impeccable as ever, because luck didn't exist for him (unless it was in a casino, in which case "luck" meant "cheating", making him the luckiest man on earth).

In the dim afternoon light, he could barely see the three thieves from before – the young couple and their decoy − huddled around a small pile of pilfered wallets and jewelry.

"I can see five guys through the windows, but I'm smelling more than that," Naruto said.

"Twelve," Kakashi corrected him. "At least that many humans. There could be more, but we'd have to get closer," Kakashi explained.

"How long does it take to learn all that?" Naruto asked.

"It depends. It's not solely a matter of hard work, but also genetics. Some people are born with more receptors than others," Kakashi explained. "Yet another reason why dogs are more useful than toads."

"Real subtle, sensei," Ino rolled her eyes. "Are all those scents fresh?"

"Yes," Naruto answered. "The ones I can figure out, anyway."

"I can't sense anything other than weak chakra, but then again, my range isn't the best. I'd have to get closer to give an exact reading, but then I'd be losing cover." She turned to him and Naruto. "You guys are absolutely certain these extra scents are recent?"

"Positive," Kakashi answered. His nose hadn't failed him yet.

Ino sighed, tapping her chin, and Kakashi could practically see her methodically sorting through multitudes of different potential actions in her mind. There was a wonderful, raw cunning to her tactical style, as opposed to Shikamaru's ruthless efficiency or Naruto's wild unpredictability. He could separately give his three students the same scenario, and each one of them would come up with their own unique, yet perfectly plausible, plan. The best part was, they were starting to get to the point where they could accurately think in one another's shoes – if he asked them, in the same quiz, what sort of plan they thought their teammates might come up with, they could answer with about 75% accuracy.

"Civilian or no, we can't rush blindly into something while carrying limited intelligence. I don't want anyone here getting unnecessarily hurt. If there really are foreign nin down there, then catching a few measly pickpockets isn't much in comparison," she answered. "I say we try to find a better point where we can observe them more carefully, and ask for backup if necessary. I'm pretty sure we can take them, but I want to eliminate any chance that we missed some guy hiding in the back, where the wind can't reach. Once we're sure that there's no one else, we can regroup here and figure out our plan of attack."

She quickly scratched out a crude topographical diagram of their region, with little triangular landmarks designating the overhang of their observation point straight across from the thieves' hideout. "I want us to stick together, for safety, but five is the number where a group starts getting large and unwieldy. Not to mention, having all of us in one spot when something goes wrong is a major gamble. I propose we split up into smaller groups of three and two."

"Makes sense. Who's going where?" Shikamaru asked.

"Naruto, if you don't mind, will be going in the group of two, since your shadow clones can easily offset any numerical disadvantage. Also, I intend split up Kakashi-sensei and Yamato-sensei, so that there can be a Jonin in each, and Naruto and Kakashi-sensei in separate groups as well, so we can have a good scent-tracker in each. Everyone with me so far?"

Naruto, Shikamaru, and Yamato flashed her a thumbs-up. Kakashi did, too, but with much less enthusiasm. Considering what had happened with Itachi Uchiha, he was loath to let any one of his kids out of his sight for even a single moment. After all, Kurenai and Asuma had been elite Jonin, too.

He flipped a marked kunai in his hand. Unlike his old teacher's special three-pronged design, these ones were simply the regular everyday standard-issues that he'd slapped a seal on at the last minute. He hadn't had the heart to make an idea that had once belonged to a dead man his own. Even now, they still felt wobbly and unsteady, like he wasn't meant to use them.

 _Minato-sensei looked absolutely invincible when he used this technique. Now that I have it, too, I don't feel invincible at all. I still feel like all those other dime-a-dozen not-so-elite-after-all Jonin who would get completely flattened when facing anyone S-ranked._

For the sake of his students, however, he'd have to at least pretend that he was his usual calm, confident, unshakeable self. It was expected of him.

"Before we move on to the part about the plan itself, does anyone object to their placements?" Ino asked authoritatively.

 _Yes,_ Kakashi thought. _I don't want any of you to leave me. I want to go home._ But he shook his head along with everyone else.

He felt disgustingly immature and weak. It was incredibly disconcerting. Was it the truth he internally knew but was unwilling to admit, that he wasn't _ready_? The knowledge that he wasn't yet up to his former level of skill? That the Hokage had been right in his attempt to keep him home for another few months?

No, that couldn't be it; he'd been perfectly fine (right, perhaps not perfectly, but certainly not so nervous) when leaving the village with Jiraiya.

Maybe it was just the fact that he had his students to think about now? After all the drama and danger that kept following at their heels, he had a right to be constantly worried about them. But no, that wasn't it, either. He was always worried for his amazing, perfect team, _always all the time_ , so he was used to that feeling. He _knew_ what the sense of worry for someone's wellbeing felt like and this wasn't it. He could still feel that low, omnipresent, parental overprotectiveness swimming underneath his thoughts – underneath whatever _this_ was.

It was a nasty, sickly, instinctive sense of unease, like his dogs would feel whenever a storm was near.

Ino was still talking, pointing to her rough map as she did so. "I want to position you two here. From there, you can scan around the outside…" And on she went, reviewing the various field signals in case anyone passed outside of her range for her mind transfers, outlining backup plans b through e, highlighting the locations of a few thick spiny undergrowths that they could use to their advantage, and covering every base she or anyone else could possibly think of. Not even the muddy terrain escaped her notice.

For all the emphasis she placed on "capturing them alive so we can reintegrate them into society later", that girl was viciously thorough. For a moment, Kakashi completely forgot that he was supposed to be scared out of his wits.

"That's it. Everyone have their radios?" Ino whispered. The four of them collectively gave her their affirmative. "Then break!" He, Ino, and Shikamaru moved over to the left side of the cave, and Naruto and Yamato went right.

As he, Ino, and Shikamaru rounded behind their vantage point, they heard someone yell something about melons and tattoos, followed by a round of crude laughter and then a shriek of pain. It was the last of the pickpockets, leaning against the back wall, mending her torn jacket with a red-stained sewing needle while the man next to her hopped about on a punctured foot.

She had been wearing only a tank top and some bandage wraps underneath it, so her chest was fully visible.

"Oh, gods," he breathed, when her hair shifted and revealed the smooth skin of her shoulders.

His head was burning.

 _[What? See something you like?]_ Yamato's teasing voice floated into his earpiece.

"The exact opposite!" Kakashi snapped.

And, as if working with a mind of its own, his hand moved up to his own shoulder, where he, too, had an identical seal.

* * *

 **A/N:** **Assuming the Uchiha massacre happened before little-Sasuke could ask his parents where babies came from, Sasuke's "experiences" in canon would have been limited to 1) Academy lectures, 2) stolen glimpses of Kakashi's books, and 3) Orochimaru.**

 **Poor kid; no wonder he was so messed up.**


	42. The River Runs Red

_Jiraiya's secret office, which everyone seems to know the location of_

Things were still completely screwed up in Sound or whatever (shitty name for a Hidden Village, if Jiraiya had to speak the truth), which only meant more trouble for him. As usual. This morning, fourteen squads of ANBU had found and raided yet another one of Orochimaru's secret hidden labs, bringing home armfuls and armfuls of crap. Now it was up to Jiraiya to wade through all of the nasty seal work he left behind.

Or, well, the nastiest seal work. The regular things had gone through the ANBU sealing division, and all the stuff they couldn't figure out they sent to Jiraiya to figure out for them. They were not incompetent, but sadly for them Orochimaru always enjoyed making his work more complicated than it was supposed to be.

He had five desks piled high with the stuff, and he suspected that those piles would only grow over the next few months. All of that, on top of that _other_ project the Sandaime had given him, which also coincidentally involved Orochimaru and his ugly brain. And of course Kakashi, who was a special piece of work in his own category.

Barring the already massive and still growing clusterfuck that Orochimaru had left behind in his temporary death – the whole situation was made even worse with the realization that a) it would take months for Jiraiya and ANBU's fuinjutsu corps to get through all those _decades_ of illegal research, and b) while Orochimaru had kept numerical records of how many curse seals he had left pieces of his own soul in to ensure that he wouldn't be _dead_ even if he _died_ , he never kept records of his test subjects' identities – many of whom had successfully escaped with their lives upon news of his death/temporary incapacitation.

Typical Orochimaru. He had never cared about individuals in particular. His old teammate wasn't one to think about _whose_ lives he was ruining as long as he had all his numbers accounted for.

Jiraiya wasn't sure when his friend had gone wrong, exactly – Jiraiya himself had been too busy wrapped up in his own missions. What Jiraiya _did_ remember was Orochimaru holding Tsunade as she cried over Dan's still-warm corpse, Orochimaru shedding tears every time another funeral was held for a fallen comrade, and Orochimaru refusing to speak to anyone for a month when Sakumo had taken his own famous tanto to the gut…

 _He used to be a good guy. He used to be a good, compassionate person with loves, hopes, and dreams._ Jiraiya pored through the details of the experiments and felt sick. _When did you go so horribly, irreversibly_ wrong _, old friend?_

Whatever. That old jackass could rot in a hole for all Jiraiya cared.

 _Knock knock._

Jiraiya turned in his chair, expecting to see Kakashi reporting in for another round of torture. Literally. He'd torture himself with the Hiraishin, and after that he'd torture Jiraiya by forcing him to lug him home.

"Not today, you little shite – I've already got enough to do; haven't you noticed?"

Instead, he came face-to-face with a very harassed-looking little boy exhibiting what seemed to be an eternally constipated look on his face.

Meaning he was probably an Uchiha.

"My name is Sasuke Uchiha," the kid said.

 _Called it._

So what if there was only one of them left in Konoha. Shut up. He was Jiraiya of the fucking Sannin, all right?

"So?" Jiraiya said, implying in his very posture that family names, especially those of deposed clans, meant nothing to him. He was already dealing with one self-important little prick on a regular basis; he didn't need another one bringing even more cancer than was physically necessary into his already quite cancerous life, thank you very much.

The kid shoved his hands in his pockets. "Tsunade told me to see you."

"About what?" Jiraiya asked.

His ears flushed. "Well, one of my teammates was training with her, and she said you might be able to teach me about some…things…?"

Jiraiya gestured behind him. "Sorry, kid, no can do. My schedule is already full." Stupid Uchihas. Thinking the world was out there for them to take on a silver platter. Jiraiya was not impressed. What Tsunade did was up to her; did they really expect him to take up a student just because she had?

He held out a note. "She said you wouldn't say no…"

"A letter of recommendation?" Jiraiya snorted. "Kid, you could be the Sage of Six Paths and I still wouldn't have the time – "

But before he could finish his sentence, he caught a glimpse of what the note actually said.

 _Please, Jiraiya, do your duty to this poor soul. If the brat is going to revive his clan, he has GOT to stop being such a total virgin._

Jiraiya blinked. Once. Twice.

And he started laughing his ass off.

The boy turned red in indignation. "It's not funny!"

Jiraiya grinned at him, still choking down his guffaws. "I'm your shishou, kid. If I say it's funny, then it's fucking hilarious. Come on."

He pouted, about to protest again, until he realized what Jiraiya had just said. "Really? You're just going to say yes, just like that?"

"Look, do you want to be my apprentice or not?" Jiraiya grunted, getting up.

"Well – yes! Of course! I just didn't think it'd be this easy – "

"Ah, shut up, runt. We're burning daylight here. Let's go!"

"But…where are we going?"

"I need a break from this shit. Lesson number one."

"What? _Now?_ "

"Yes, now!"

"What are we doing?"

"Teaching you how to stop being such a total virgin, _duh_."

"But it's still daylight out – "

"…So?"

* * *

 _Wave Country_

Ino's feet gripped the tree branch with extra force as she noticed all the color abruptly drain from Kakashi-sensei's face. "Ino," he said hoarsely, "we might have to call an abort."

Ino's head whipped back around to face her sensei, who was still gripping his shoulder tightly.

"You can't feel it, can you?" she asked quickly.

Kakashi-sensei shook his head. "No, Jiraiya did a fine job. This curse seal, mine, is dead. But even without the Sharingan working, I can tell you right now that theirs," he pointed down to the group of pickpockets, "are not."

"How did we miss that earlier?" Shikamaru grumbled angrily.

"The initial three we ran into and followed back here don't have it," Kakashi-sensei whispered. "And a good chunk of them also have civilian-level chakra."

"Be careful," Shikamaru warned. "The ground feels weird around here."

"You said there were twelve, right? Five out of the eight in front of us are civilian-level, and I don't feel anything from the four we can't see," Ino confirmed. "It's only those two girls and that boy that have enough chakra for me to pick up. Those three are the youngest out of that entire group of thieves."

"Makes sense. The guy was doing illegal experiments in a bid for immortality; the best test subjects would be younger. If we're lucky, they're not here for any reason other than trying to rebuild their lives after escaping from Orochimaru's labs," Shikamaru said. "Of course, that doesn't make them any less dangerous, if the curse seals work the way they're supposed to."

"How do you know how curse seals work?" Kakashi-sensei asked.

"I don't, but looking at them, I can see that they survived just fine while you nearly got killed taking something meant for Sasuke. Obviously they're not going to be walking away from that operation as regular human beings," Shikamaru answered, without missing a beat.

Ino saw Kakashi-sensei accept this answer and turn away, but something about Shikamaru's absolute confidence in his answer generated the exact opposite reaction in her. That answer had been too perfectly executed, the textbook description of a truthful answer.

 _He's lying,_ Ino thought. _But I don't know about what, and now is hardly the time to call him out on it when we've got so many more things to worry about._

Suddenly, Kakashi-sensei said, "Fifty-two."

"Fifty-two what?"

"I smell people."

" _Fifty-two_ of them?"

"Yes."

Ino felt her stomach drop. She had anticipated maybe one or two extra guys. She certainly couldn't sense any other shinobi-level chakra within a fifty-meter radius. First, they missed the runaway Sound experiments, and now, it was _forty_ other aggressors? How had they _missed_ forty other aggressors? "You said twelve before."

Kakashi-sensei pinched his shoulder nervously. "And now I'm saying fifty-two."

"Fifty-two pickpockets? The crime reports would be absolutely out of the roof," Shikamaru pointed out. "Not that the numbers aren't already high, but I did the calculations. If the other forty-four are even a tenth as successful as the eight we see here, there would be five times as many reports as the current number."

"Maybe they don't get caught," Ino suggested. "Or maybe people don't report, because they think it won't help. A lot of them still haven't gotten over living under Gato."

"I've accounted for that, too. That number I just gave you was assuming a 20% report rate. Most of the people getting their things stolen are rich tourists, so they wouldn't have any fear of demanding service or voicing their complaints." Shikamaru shook his head. "If there are forty ninja that have somehow managed to cloak their scent _and_ their chakra, we're in trouble."

Ino's decision was made. If she had to choose between "chicken" and alive, or stupid and dead, she'd choose chicken any time of the day. "We are leaving immediately. And we need to get this information to Naruto, and quickly," she hissed, as she considered all their relative positions. "I don't know if he can see what we saw from his angle − "

"TREES, NOW!" Shikamaru roared.

Ino didn't think twice before propelling herself upward into the closest branch in her reach. Almost as soon as her fingers made contact with the wood, her world tilted sideways, and her tree careened dangerously toward the ground. Only quick reactions and a lifetime of experience as a ninja of the Leaf Village enabled her to leap over to an adjacent, thicker tree.

And then that one began falling, too.

Acrid smoke – stinging her eyes – flying debris – shards of metal – ninja designed weapons, hurtling through the air – the smell of blistering, burning flesh –

 _BOOM._

GET DOWN –

No words exchanged. No time for thought. Felt the flash. Didn't know what it was. But she knew what to do. That was all that mattered. ( _DANGER GET DOWN_ ) Only nanoseconds between safety. _Reaction time._ Her body moved before her brain. Hit the dirt. Shikamaru, where was he? Right next to her. She grabbed his collar. Forced him down. Arms wrapped protectively around his shoulders. _Natural instinct._ A mouthful of soil never felt so good. _Better than smoke. Better than fire._

Then her brain finally caught up. _Fire jutsu._

Had she reacted any later, her entire upper body would have been covered in third-degree burns. Maybe she would have died. But, as long as she pretended that the whatever was happening in the compound was just their teacher being evil again, she'd live. Behind her, Shikamaru had erected an earth dome, as he habitually did every time Kakashi-sensei threw stuff at them when he knew they were in no position to dodge.

Ino had never appreciated her teacher's sadism more.

There were explosions and (smelly, poison) shrapnel raining down everywhere, not just their one spot. That meant there was nowhere to hide, nowhere to run. But that also meant whoever in there wasn't aiming for them directly, otherwise they wouldn't be firing so indiscriminately. Thank the gods for small mercies; it meant that they were well-hidden enough that their attackers didn't know where they were. The darkness was still on their side, it seemed. Ino pulled the collar of her shirt up over her nose. _Remember, kids,_ _smoke inhalation is very dangerous_. Anything that would help them survive.

 _I wish Naruto was here. He's the only one of us who can use air jutsu._

Below her, Ino watched in horror as the entire ground opened up beneath them in a giant, gaping hole. _More of Orochimaru's creatures. This is bad, very bad._ Kakashi-sensei and Naruto could smell the enemy, true, but it was _her_ duty as the sensor of the team to pinpoint their exact location. Her range, however, was still too small, too inadequate, and with all the dirt in the way she hadn't realized they were there. They must have been here, waiting to trap them this entire time, she realized. _And I led my team straight into this mess._ If it hadn't been for Shikamaru's quick thinking, and his tectonic locationing earth jutsu – his own invention − they would have all been done for.

She jumped again, this time, with some chakra wire attached between her fingers and the briar patch on the ground. As she flew through the air, she pulled the thorny bushes up along with her, impeding their pursuers. There was a hard crunch as the weak, dry brush snapped and gave way; it would have been foolhardy to assume that it would be enough to stop them.

Luckily, Ino had come prepared. All she needed was for them to be slowed down. In their line of work, it was impossible for them to never be taken by surprise; the important thing was to know what to do in that suboptimal situation. _Be prepared for everything you don't expect._

So these guys had taken them by surprise. Big whoop. Ino had discussed this exact scenario earlier when they were going over the action plan.

 _You mean they only took_ you _by surprise,_ a nasty little voice in her head berated her. _You were the team sensor, and yet you were the very last one to figure out something was wrong. Kakashi-sensei had his spidey senses screaming at him all the way back when you split up the teams, and Shikamaru sounded the alarm based off reading data from a half-complete technique._

The worst part was, she couldn't even argue with herself, because all of those criticisms were right. It wasn't fair to blame Shikamaru for not warning them earlier; his earth jutsu only allowed him to pinpoint the source of a vibration, not its identity. A large group of people hiding very still underground would produce the same results as a particularly large colony of burrowing mole rats.

 _Your job was to sense the people and you couldn't even do that!_

It wasn't her fault her sensing accuracy petered out at fifty meters, but at the same time, it was her fault.

Another fireball crashed into their hiding spot; Shikamaru's earth dome rocked in its foundations, threatening to fall over – but then it steadied itself, and the flames fizzled, hissing into steam upon contact.

 _I just have to survive,_ she thought, and flicked her wrist again. All the brambles in the briar patch came up once more. Of course, the ninja beneath them stomped through them like they were made of paper – but even paper had some resistance.

She wasn't stupid – she had sprayed the things with poison while she was jumping. Already she could see their cuts and scratches puffing up. She signaled to Kakashi-sensei and Shikamaru, and they both simultaneously struck the earth. Now what had once been a hiding spot was a death trap, as the sinkhole they had come out of closed up again, around their ankles.

Ino pulled her chakra wires again, and the briar patch blanketed back over the whole clearing, completing the trap. Their enemies were now right where she wanted them.

Her hands were shaking uncontrollably. This was it, right here. The point of no return. It had been so easy talking about it, but she hadn't realized the gravity of her words until she was finally staring those actions in the face.

For her to fight back now, was finally accepting, once and for all, her life as a shinobi.

Her life, and their deaths.

 _Who am I to decide who deserves to live and die? How could I ever make a choice like that?_

She squeezed her fists.

 _I will make that choice. I am the team captain. I will protect my team._

The gas bomb sailed through the air. Her lips pressed into a thin line.

" _Katsu,_ " she whispered.

The words came out as cold and tranquil as she wanted them to be.

And the forest exploded.

The aerosol expanded into an enormous blue cloud of flaming gas, spikes shooting nearly twenty feet up into the air.

 _There,_ she thought. _If Naruto and Yamato-sensei didn't realize what was wrong before, they've definitely seen the signal now._ _It's not as if we had a chance of maintaining our element of surprise after all those goons attacked us._

Ino could hear very clearly, around her, various states of coughing and screaming as they all simultaneously choked to death on the smoke while burning alive – caught with no way of escaping, while being fired at by their own side.

 _Why do I feel so unnaturally calm right now?_

 _Because you're freaking out; that's why._

"INO!"

Her left side exploded in pain.

She braced herself for the sharp impact of earth, but it never came.

She just kept falling.

* * *

Since I was little, I had known that I would one day find myself in a situation where killing was the only way out. But I had only ever thought about it in a detached, hypothetical-situation way. It wasn't until _Ino_ herself had given that order that I fully comprehended the meaning of having someone else's life on your conscience.

We were only thirteen, after all. Unusually young by the standards of most, and yet not so by our own. _Ino_. I had _known_ that girl since before either of us had teeth. Seeing her now, squashing her personal feelings for the sake of our benefit…it broke my heart.

The worst part was, the night wasn't anywhere near over. Not by a long shot.

 _Ino's plan should have worked._

Our attackers should have had their ankles broken by my earth jutsu, their veins poisoned by Ino's spiked shrubs, their skin burnt away by our bombs. Instead, they emerged from the fires, angry and scabbed, blistering and bleeding from hundreds of pierces and scratches, but miraculously alive and very, very conscious.

And no longer human.

They were enormously strong and fast, all of them, at the level of ten Narutos on a sugar high, only much more malicious. Their muscles were disproportionately bulbous, their bodies thick and heaving, their eyes yellowed and veiny. Claws and spikes and horns and fangs protruded from all over their bodies, hands and backs and heads and gums not necessarily in that order. Thick grayish saliva dripped from their mouths. They did not seem to feel the vicious burns that left their skin still bubbling. Some of them were still burning and bubbling where Ino's flammable poisons had adhered to their skin. One of them, who had directly taken the explosion from Ino's first bomb, was missing his whole arm and half his abdomen, and yet he continued to shuffle along − a demented and energetic zombie.

 _I knew the curse seal did pretty nasty things, but I hadn't expected it to be this extreme._

All of this had transpired in the matter of a few seconds. We had literally gone from the upper ground to six feet under − that giant pit, which I had closed up with my earth jutsu earlier, collapsed once more.

Taking Ino and me with it.

 _Dark._ The evening sky was a tiny speck of orange and indigo above. Everywhere else, it was black. My right hand was attached to one of Ino's arms; I couldn't be bothered to figure out which. Meanwhile, my left hand was scraping against the rocky sides of the pit as I tried to stop our descent. Not that any amount of chakra would help when the very wall you were clinging to was breaking down as well.

"Chakra strings!" Ino gasped. Out of any other options, I braced my feet against a jutting rock and latched onto her chakra wires, still attached to the thorny shrubs. But the walls were still collapsing, and if we didn't move _now_ we'd be red boulder paint. I tried to shift my hold on Ino to get a better grip on her, but I hit a wet rough patch and she started screaming – I couldn't see her, but I knew she was definitely bleeding.

This was dangerous. If she was knocked out by the tunnel collapse she could very well suffocate. Even natural earth users could easily die if they lost consciousness while underground. Chakra could sustain them for a little while, but we were still Genin and didn't have much of it. My head was pounding, and I could feel liquid trailing down my temples. I was hoping it was simply from scratching my head on a sharp rock, and not because I was bleeding out of my ears. Desperately I attempted to create an air pocket in the earth, but one of my arms was trapped, looped around Ino's shoulder, and the dirt here was too dense for me to do the technique without seals.

Before I had anymore time to contemplate how screwed we were, however, an underground cave miraculously opened up beneath us as if by magic –

"Brace positions!" someone yelled, and I felt arms wrap around me.

− I had approximately one-tenth of a second to curl up into a ball and surround myself in a pillow of chakra. Needless to say, the impact was horribly unpleasant. My stomach was in my mouth and my joints were howling and I had definitely messed up the backs of my hands trying to cradle my head and neck –

"Kakashi-sensei," Ino whispered.

 _Why the heck is the Hiraishin no Jutsu so crazily useful?_ my pain-addled brain giggled.

"Quiet," Kakashi-sensei murmured. "This air pocket is way bigger than I intended it to be."

Instinctively, I analyzed the situation, since my pounding skull wasn't capable of much more. _Obviously they're already here, waiting for us –_

Kakashi-sensei clapped his hand over my mouth.

 _Shoot, am I talking out loud?_

"Yes," he growled.

Still incorrigible, my mouth disattached itself from my weakened brain and slurred, _No point; they already know we're here; hard to miss a bunch of screaming landslides −_

One by one, dozens and dozens of little glowing dots appeared around us as the dirt walls crumbled. A rain of soil and rocks sprayed down upon us while the remainder of Orochimaru's leftovers, hiding in ambush, burst out of their burrows. It was something straight out of a claustrophobic's worst nightmare.

All of them were muttering something about a Sharingan; I couldn't tell exactly what because my head was pounding too loudly and my eardrums were stuffed full of cotton and I could barely see. _Idiots, he doesn't have it anymore! You're all wasting your time! Leave us alone!_

A terrifying rumbling interrupted me when the entire cavern violently tossed us back and forth, vibrating in all directions enough to make my teeth crack and my mouth bite itself and my jaw go slack. Next to me, Ino's muscles were tightening, and though she said nothing I could only imagine how much pain she was holding down.

 _Let's see... the amplitude was too small to be an earthquake; something on this scale would be a large rock coming loose at best…the back of my head felt the rumble about a hundredth of a second before either of my hands did, and judging by the intersection of their radii…square root of the squares of the horizontal and vertical components…meaning the source of the shaking came from…_

In the back of my mind there was this vague sense that I was being significantly stupider than usual, that I shouldn't have needed to explicitly think about such a simple geometry calculation. But my head hurt too much for me to be making any sense of the situation. Everything around me moved like insects drenched in amber, limbs made from melting lead. Nauseous. Mouth full of cotton. Maybe I drank some extra-strong sake laced with drugs by accident and now I'm hungover and hallucinating and probably dead, I didn't know anymore −

… _right above me._

My head snapped up.

Boulder. Falling.

I did the only thing I could do – I grabbed Ino and threw her away from me as hard as I could.

Kakashi-sensei screamed as if he was a wild beast gone mad.

 _What's an Obito?_ I wondered.

Something warm and wet and coppery exploded in my face.

 _Blood, definitely blood_.

And then more blood. And more blood. And more. And more.

* * *

BONUS #36

[wwwdot] fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/159240388/1/Bonus-36-Sasuke-Gets-Sex-Ed-PG-13

* * *

 **A/N: Thanks for all of your guys' feedback, as always.**

 **Since this has been brought up a few times in the past, here's a question for everyone: who would you like to see more of (in terms of screen time/POV)? This is one of the things I will need constant reminders of, since I already know everyone's timelines.**


	43. And They Shall Reap the Whirlwind

BONUS #37:

[wwwdot] fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/159693702/1/

* * *

 _Amegakure_

"I believe you summoned us here for an important meeting, Tobi-sama."

With no small amount of glee, Tobi noticed that Nagato was trying his very hardest to stay civil. Naturally, this meant he absolutely _had_ to prod him.

"Yes, Tobi has some very important things to say!" he bounced up and down in his chair, making sure to use the third person like a cutesy five-year-old girl. "One, Tobi is a good boy~! Two, Tobi is a very very very good boy~! Three, Tobi is a wonderful boy who – "

Immediately, Nagato winced, having done this enough times to know exactly where this would lead. "Tobi-sama, _please_ – "

Tobi mock-gasped. "Tobi is _not_ a good boy! Tobi made Nagato-sama _sad_! Tobi is very sorry!"

"Tobi-sama, please. It is only the three of us," Konan interruped. "You do not need to pretend before Nagato and me – "

"Tobi doesn't know what you are talking about it. Tobi is a good boy and Tobi will listen to Nagato-sama because Tobi is a good boy – "

"WILL YOU _STOP?_ "

At this, Tobi completely switched his personality around. "Re _lax_ , Nagato- _sama_. Honestly. All of that pent-up anger…that can't be healthy."

Nagato rolled his eyes.

"And for your information, I actually _don't_ exist solely for the purpose of making other people angry," Tobi interrupted sweetly, knowing exactly what the other was thinking.

"Perhaps we should get back on topic and discuss the truly important things, instead of arguing with each other like this," Konan suggested, as calm as ever. "Like the rest of the jinchuuriki, for example. The Ichibi is still missing and Konoha hasn't given any indication what they've done to him. Maybe we should leave him alone for now and target the Nibi instead?"

At this, Tobi allowed his demeanor to take a more serious turn. "Yugito Nii is well-trained and even more well-guarded." He snorted derisively. "Kumogakure is the only village that actually knows what to do with their jinchuuriki."

"She is a powerful ninja in her own right, but so are all the members of the Akatsuki."

"The problem isn't capturing the jinchuuriki," Tobi explained. "It's _Kumogakure_ as a village. We have no missing-nin from Kumogakure in our fold, and they are extremely possessive of their bijuu. If we stole a ninja from Iwa or Kiri, no one would bat an eyelash. But if we attempt anything on Yugito Nii, we would be noticed immediately – for a failure would only result in her reporting back to her superiors, and a success would cause said superiors to notice her missing. We can't randomly snatch her up like we did to the others."

Konan nodded. "By that logic, Konoha would also be a problem. It's as if every single ninja they spit out from there has a teammate complex. Didn't you hear about what Kakashi Hatake did to Orochimaru when the guy attacked while his students were taking the Chunin exams – "

"I _KNOW_ ," Tobi roared, and Konan and Nagato jumped in their seats. _Deep breaths. Calm down. Don't think about that – that dirty promise-breaker, and you'll be fine._ "Let's not talk about Konoha or Hatake."

Nagato cleared his throat and changed the subject. "I would like to mention that Kumo has always been very self-serving and independent. If someone went missing from their village, they'd send people after us, but the point is, they'd try to take care of the problem alone. Konoha, on the other hand, would be the very first to stir up trouble with their neighbors. A mass alliance with us as their common enemy is the last thing we need."

Tobi leaned back and started tapping the chin of his orange spiral mask. "Then we'll just have to ensure those alliances never happen. The villages would be liable to bring out their best weapons during war, and if people go missing, it's more likely that the loss would be attributed to other villages, or combat casualties, than us."

"Yes, but we've already _tried_ that," Nagato said. "Tanyu, remember? It didn't work. Konoha didn't even so much as point a finger at Iwa. Somehow Jiraiya figured out it was us, even after we used Kiri as a catspaw."

Tobi waved a hand dismissively. "Forget Konoha. They already knew about us. It's not about convincing Konoha to go to war against others; it's about convincing others to go to war against Konoha. And by others, I mean Kumo. Whatever it takes to bring both villages' jinchuuriki out into the field."

Nagato and Konan both bowed, and left. When they were gone, Tobi – once upon a time, known as – well, that wasn't important, because that was no longer _him_ anymore – settled back in his chair and closed his eyes. Sleep rarely came easily to him; even the shortest naps were highly valuable. Most of the time, he wouldn't be able to get a few minutes in before everything would just come _running back at him and no he wanted to forget why couldn't he just forget –_

The nightmares came anyway, unbidden. No matter what he tried to do, they always came, and they were always the same. First, excruciating pain. And then, nothing but the musty smell of stale air. All feeling, gone. Surrounded by dirt and dimness, unable to see even the smallest hint of sunlight. And then, just as he had been about to accept that his life had been forfeit –

Tobi didn't care much. About how he was still alive, that is. He touched the rough half of his body; it was definitely not flesh. Artificial. But it was a part of him, and it was keeping him alive. So he stuck with it.

And while he remembered loving fresh air and missing the sun, he couldn't fathom _why_. There was nothing really special about fresh air and sun. Tobi chalked it up to yet another one of his naïve idiosyncrasies of youth, quirks that he had long since grown out of.

 **Who am I?** Black Zetsu had said, the first time they met. **I am the will of the gods.**

 _"Gods? You mean…like the Sage of Six Paths?"_

 **Your precious Sage?** Black Zetsu had laughted. **He is nothing compared to me. He gave chakra to the world like a fool. I am the origin of chakra itself.**

 _"The origin of chakra? But – how – I'm confused – "_ Tobi had asked, like the stupid child he once was.

 **The Sage of Six Paths was the first person on earth to be** _ **born**_ **with chakra. How could a helpless newborn have gotten such a power?**

 _"Well – if he was_ born _with it – then maybe something happened while his mother was…"_

 **Exactly. Your god would be nothing without his gift. And who do you think gave that gift to him?**

Tobi's eyes snapped open, cold sweat running down his face. For just a second, he remembered being someone else, and then it was gone again, all in the blink of a single Sharingan eye.

* * *

 _Wave Country: the Cave_

Flashes of falling rock –

Iron –

Red earth −

The moment he saw the boulder coming down, Kakashi lunged for Ino and Shikamaru. _I can't teleport with passengers, but if I get there fast enough I can grab them and get them out of the way first. I'll worry about the rock and myself later,_ he added, even though he knew in his heart that his timing wouldn't allow him to save himself as well.

 _Pick a seal; the one on Ino or Shikamaru?_

The Hiraishin marker sparked. He jumped –

Ino flew through the air _crap why is my reference point moving?_

− and landed an entire meter behind where he should have.

Ino, still airborne, crashed into him.

"He threw me," she rasped, and Kakashi could only think, in horror, _I should have picked the seal on Shikamaru_ as the boy disappeared behind half a ton of compacted sandstone.

Sick, he felt sick. The iron scent of blood. Obito's broken face smiling up at him. The walls of the cave moved inwards, shrinking, tightening around his chest, and he couldn't breathe, but this wasn't claustrophobia, couldn't _possibly_ be; he had crawled through pipes and tunnels and the narrow spaces between wall panels without issue; why should a _cave filled with falling boulders_ be any different?

His vision tunneled, blurring everywhere except right in front of his face, where the piece of scum responsible for that rockslide was drawing a dagger.

And something inside Kakashi _broke_.

"You lot," he spat, "are all much too alive for my liking."

The cleverest one of the bunch was also the first one to realize his best course of action was to run. Unfortunately for him, he was also the one standing closest to Kakashi.

Kakashi pulled his elbow back, and let his knuckles snap forward with enough force to shatter some ribs, or maybe cause some vital organs to explode, or both. Knees, his knees, swung forward, up and around; his foot caught a cheekbone on the front so hard it concaved like an inside-out contact lens; the strength of his kick made his whole leg rebound, where his heel met another shattered skull. Then the back of his knee contacted a third person, and yes, that definitely felt like a neck, so with his leg still looped around that patch of vertebrae, he corkscrewed in the air, using his waist as a fulcrum, and _SNAP_ went their spine.

The curse seals were making them stronger, but at the end of the day, a snapped neck was still a snapped neck, and they dropped to the floor like a sack of rocks. If Kakashi had stopped to observe his surroundings, he would have noticed blank eyes, but in the moment, he had already zeroed in on his fourth victim. In an instant he was launching himself through the air, not caring that he was diving headfirst into a horde of artificially enhanced freaks of nature.

He caught his fifth by the throat and collapsed his windpipe with a well-aimed punch. He struck his sixth, over and over again, as if his fists were made of hardened steel instead of flesh. Whatever damage he was causing himself in his mindless attacks, he did not feel.

"Ten dead in fifteen seconds," he hissed, dropping the remains of his latest kill on his sandals. "I must be getting slow."

Before him, the survivors turned and ran.

They didn't get far.

* * *

 _ANBU Containment Complex 317-C, Level 7B_

The demon inside him no longer spoke to him, except in nightmares. But the nightmares never lasted more than a few seconds at a time before he would be woken up by a feeling of burning chakra on his stomach, and when he did wake up he'd completely forget what the demon had been trying to tell him. All he could remember were short snatches of "Mother" and "sand", but otherwise, nothing.

 _That was not Mother. That was never Mother._

 _The demon's name is Shukaku. And your name is Gaara._

He had moved cells multiple times thus far – eleven, if he was counting correctly – each one bigger than the last. He had lost track of how long he had spent in this place otherwise. Every cell they gave him was comfortable, and they always put some sort of genjutsu on the walls to make it more interesting. They adjusted the lighting, too, to imitate sunlight during what was supposed to be day hours and starlight at night.

Gaara wondered why he felt so accepting of this situation. He had heard many tales of men doing desperate things when trapped in one confined location for a long time. Maybe it was because he had never known any freedom to begin with.

Besides, the people were decent to him. Most of the time, they would just sit there and talk. And listen, when Gaara had things to say. Gaara rarely had things to say, but the point was, they cared when he did.

Somewhere in the back of his mind, his brain registered that he was still in a prison, no matter how well-treated he might be here. But this prison was only a physical one. He had been in prison his whole life, even if he was outdoors. This was a step above that.

That was what he tried to convince himself. _One day,_ they promised, _we'll let you out. We're just making sure that you don't relapse and try to kill everyone around you._ Hope, that one day he'd really be free. Hope was a foreign concept to him, but it wasn't entirely unpleasant. Just like the concept of people not screaming and running away from him…

Konoha was different, obviously. In Suna, people regarded him with distrust. Well, actually, in Konoha, they distrusted him, too, but they gave him the same amount of distrust they gave Temari and Kankuro, so it wasn't about _him_ specifically. The other kids didn't scream and run away from him; that was for certain. Until he had started that bloodbath during the second phase – but no one really escaped to tell the tale then…

…He was never bored in this place, that was for certain. There was always something for him to do. Books. Cards. Board games. Sand and water. Clay. Plastic toy bricks. Paints. Origami. Movies. TV programmes. Food. Paper and pencil, to "put his feelings down on paper" – he wasn't very good at it, but the blonde man assured him that he was getting better. _He said his name was Inoichi. I suppose I should remember that; I haven't heard many names in this place._ If he ever wanted anything – more knowledge, or a craft, or entertainment, or human companionship – all he had to do was press a button and speak into the box.

Politely, of course. The first few times, they let him get away with just saying "I want," but after that, they always insisted that he use "would like" and "may I" and "please" instead. Gaara didn't see what the difference was, because those extra words seemed like a waste of breath for him, but he humored them anyway since arguing just brought more strife.

 _No killing things here, Gaara. No throwing a tantrum just because you can't get your way._

If he ever did something bad, they'd take little privileges away. If the transgression was minor, like ignoring the blonde man, Inoichi, when he tried to initiate a conversation, they'd force him to be the one to talk first the next time he came down. If it was major, like trying to make up for Shukaku's absence in his mind in some violent way, they'd take away all the nice wallpaper and trinkets and force him to sit in the corner and think about what he'd done.

He was getting a lot better, though. They hadn't taken anything away recently – on the contrary, there were always so many things to do at any given moment that Gaara often wished he had more time to just explore all of his options. So the fact that this entire time, he had been trapped between _four walls a ceiling and a floor_ , for twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, had barely registered.

Until today.

"I want to go out," Gaara demanded.

Silence.

"Please?" Gaara added, perhaps a bit belatedly. He wondered if that would count against him.

Inoichi tilted his head to the side. "Again? You just spent the whole morning running around in the exercise yard."

"No, I meant, _out_. Of here," he explained.

"Ah, I see," Inoichi said, making a mark on his clipboard. "Why do you want to go outside?"

Gaara frowned. "I don't know. I just…do. You promised that you'd let me out one day." There was that sinking pit of despair again, one that Gaara hadn't felt since he was very small, when none of the other kids wanted to play with him. A childish sentiment. He didn't know why it was resurfacing now.

"And we will. Tell me, what are you planning to do once you go out? What do you want to see? Who do you want to meet? What do you hope to do? You need some sort of direction in your life, Gaara, or it will all be completely pointless."

Inoichi always liked asking these hard questions, because they never had any right answer. You couldn't look up Inoichi's questions in a book. He had read many books during this time span, and he could say with certainty that none of them ever had any answers for Inoichi's questions. Mainly because Inoichi's questions were always about _him_ , and no one had ever written any books about him.

"I want to meet…more people…? Besides just you? Hopefully they'll be like you, though. And not. You know. The others."

"Okay. That's reasonable enough; I'm sure there will be plenty of friendly people you can talk to. Anything else?"

Gaara shrugged. "So you're not letting me leave today?"

"Not right away, unfortunately. It's not your fault; I just have to do a bunch of stupid paperwork." Inoichi shrugged and grinned. "Silly pencil pushing and all that. How about I make it up to you by taking you outside the gate tomorrow?"

Outside the gate! Gaara loved going beyond the fence. They didn't do it very often, but when they did, he got to climb trees and jump around and chase the squirrels.

"Yes!"

Inoichi made another mark on his clipboard. "All right. But you have to promise me that you'll be good, okay?"

"I promise I'll be good," he whispered. "I won't lose control ever again, I promise."

"And I trust you, Gaara. Until next time."

* * *

 _Wave Country: the Cliffs_

Naruto's veins were ice.

Which was sadly ironic, considering he was surrounded by fire on every side.

The air was saturated with the thick blanket of wood smoke and burning sap and the sharp stabbing acrid scent of ignited alcohol and formaldehyde and a million other chemicals he had no idea how to identify. His eyes filled up with tears and grit; his nose peeled itself raw; his throat was worse than the deserts of Sunagakure. Everything was too loud, too bright, too crowded, too hot and too cold at the same time.

None of that mattered when Ino, Shikamaru, and Kakashi-sensei were nowhere to be found. Just a bunch of monsters with ugly snarling faces and beady aundiced eyes and feather-shaped tattoos of black ink spiraling across their backs and chests like an evolving fungus, and they were _there_ but _not Kakashi-sensei and Ino and Shikamaru._

His lungs collapsed.

It wasn't the smoke and fire. Naruto snapped his head up and barely managed to roll to the side as an enormous fist the size of his thigh came bearing down upon him again. The rock cracked, and it would have been comical – for the owner of said fist was only half his size – had they not been trying to _kill him_.

Sparks erupted around his broken ribcage as the Kyuubi's magic did its work. Naruto smirked at his opponent's shock.

 _Ha-ha! You're not the only one with unreal healing abilities around here!_

The giant rhino-thing swung his other fist. Naruto dodged once more, jumped to his feet, and prepared to slug the guy in the stomach –

− but then the guy's chest opened up of its own accord and a bunch of tentacles burst from the hole in one of those bizarre moves from the alien parasite horror movies he'd sneak into as a kid and what in the world that was _nasty_ –

They weren't tentacles, they were wooden branches, and they also caught fire, and what the heck did a bunch of branches just explode out of him _what?_

"Naruto, get up!" Yamato snapped. Naruto was yanked up by the collar and dragged across a patch of empty ground. And not a moment too soon; the moment he had vacated his earlier position, an entire porcupine's worth of quills filled his place. Yamato turned, and in one fluid motion buried a kunai into the skull of a woman with long spiky hedgehog hair. She was Jiraiya, only black hair instead of white. And she had lines of piercings all over her cheeks instead of face paint.

She went down, jewelry clinking −

She stumbled to her feet, forehead still dripping, and yanked the kunai out. The dribble of red became a spurting fountain. Naruto thought she was done for –

The black marks pulsed, and the wound sealed itself.

Asymmetrical, horrifying, monstrous, they were all monsters, they were crawling at him, Ino and Shikamaru and Kakashi-sensei needed him, and he _couldn't get to them_ because these _things_ kept _getting in his way!_

 _They hurt my friends. They_ hurt _them. I can smell blood on them. My_ friends' _blood._

A claw wrapped around his neck. It started squeezing the life out of him. But if they thought that was all it took to drain the fight out of Naruto Uzumaki, they had another thing coming.

Ninja Rules, Abridged: there is no such thing as fighting dirty.

It was unfortunate, for the poor soul trying to kill him, that a jinchuuriki was the most dangerous and unstable when they were at their weakest point. A contradictory statement, but that was unimportant when a pair of two-inch-long claws were raking down your eyes.

"That bastard!" someone yelled; Naruto wasn't sure who, since there were at least twenty of them. "Capture the Copy-Nin! Just take the damn kids as bait and he'll go barrelling into whatever trap you give him,they said! It'll be easy; Konoha nin are bleeding hearts for teammates,they said! 'Couple of dumb Genin,' my ass!"

"What is that _thing?_ " one of the others screamed. "That is _not_ a freaking Genin!"

His heel met something soft and squishy. Someone's gut. _Good._ He buried it deeper. His tongue scraped something sharp.

Another arm wrapped around his head. He sank his razor-sharp fangs into it. The flesh gave way easily. His teeth kept going until it met hard bone. Hard bone became brittle bone. It cracked and broke, too, spilling out the orange marrow. Shrieks of pain. He kept going. He felt tree branches wrapping all around him, draining his chakra, but instead of becoming weaker all he felt was moremore _moreMORE_ chakra coursing through him in a never-ending flood and splinters were flying everywhere, evaporating into smoke as they hit the flames and he kept going and going and going because orange, everything was orange. Splinters flew; they were the size of large twigs. They, too, were orange. He didn't know where Yamato was. The orange grew and grew, and his skin was burning but his veins were ice.

Wait.

Orange?

Why was bone _orange?_

On that note, why was everything as far as he could see _orange_? The stuff was everywhere, lighting up the night with an eerie glow, a beast indiscriminately consuming everything in its path, plowing through the sandstone, as easily as Naruto could finish a bowl of ramen (which he _really, really_ wanted right now, because ramen was so much better than watching dozens of people instantaneously dissolve alive).

 _Ha, hah, HA, BWaHahHAHA! You really_ are _stupid!_

"SHUT IT, FOX!" Naruto screamed. "What are you doing, my friends are in trouble, stop stop stop STOP IT!"

 _What do you mean, stop it? You've mastered some of my tails already, haven't you? You can call upon that portion of my chakra whenever you want. All of that is_ yours _to control._

"No!" Naruto sobbed. "Don't, _don't_ − !"

 _Oh, you stupid little thing. Don't you get it? Don't blame the madness on me, kiddo. This is_ you. _This is_ all you _._

"Stop it! Stop it! STOP IT!" Naruto screamed himself hoarse, and so was Yamato, and _oh there you are Yamato, I can see you now. Where did you go?_

What? Yamato was screaming something, too.

"NARUTO! STOP! _STOP!_ "

And he was going to stop, _I swear I was going to_ –

But then right in front of his face one of Orochimaru's experiments was hobbling away, back turned to him, fully exposed. And armies were easiest to kill when routed.

Naruto could smell the earth and the wind and the scent of his friends on that man. The earth and the wind and the _blood of my friends_ on that man. His disgusting claws and fists, they were stained with the smell of Ino and Shikamaru. _That's him, right there. That was the one that had drawn first blood_ and _that man made my friend bleed_ and he was right THERE and _I can't stop here_ and that man had to pay for what he did _someone needs to draw his blood_ and he was running away from Naruto by fleeing underground _I have to catch him before he escapes_ who's the real monster now _I don't know_.

So Naruto did not stop.

* * *

 **A/N: Remember in the canon Wave arc, where Naruto thought Haku killed Sasuke, and he went a little nuts? Now, think of how badly that might have ended for Haku, had he been dealing with Naruto when he was already halfway through his bijuu training.**

 **Also, I would like to note that Jiraiya isn't training Sasuke instead of Naruto. They're both learning, eh, "different" techniques.**


	44. Shards of Glass

_Wave Country: the Cliffs_

His Mokuton was useless. Absolutely useless. No matter how hard Yamato tried, his branches kept evaporating into smoke before they could come into contact with Naruto. Infusing more of his chakra into the wood did absolutely no good – before the might of the Kyuubi, it shriveled and dried just like all of his hopes and dreams.

The twister Naruto let out ripped through about a dozen of the fallen trees that Shikamaru had collapsed earlier, and it furiously descended upon the already-raging fire in a whirling tornado.

This was no ordinary inferno. The curse seal experiments could shrug off heat burns from a regular fire with little to no pain. Chakra poisoning from a jinchuuriki, however, was an entirely different matter.

Yamato scanned the battlefield. Normally, in such a situation, he'd call for a retreat, but…

…Naruto was singlehandedly decimating – everything, really.

 _They've got us surrounded, the poor bastards._

The flames jumped about, some reaching within a foot of his face. All around him, their attackers were shriveling up, literally _shriveling_ , like they were pieces of hair held up against a candle. That was the chakra poisoning. By all means, Yamato himself should have been incinerated along with the rest of them, but he felt none of the poison. Just the natural heat that any burning object emanated.

He had no time to wonder if he was safe because the power of the Kyuubi's chakra was so concentrated that one had to be physically touching the flames to feel its effect, or because some remnant of the Shodaime's genetics implanted in him was keeping him alive. Gods, he hated the smell of burning rubber with a passion – _crud_ , his sandals were melting from the sheer power of the Kyuubi's chakra. Yamato forced himself into a jump, and not a moment too soon, either, because as soon as his feet left the ground, the entire mountainside _shifted_.

No, not shifted – it was _melting_.

Solid rock! _Melting!_

Yamato squinted through the thick black smoke in a last-ditch attempt to locate his ridiculously overpowered charge. What he saw made his jaw drop.

No, he wasn't hallucinating. This was not scorched earth, nor was it the bright coloring of the flames contrasting with the dim lighting of the setting sun to play tricks on his eyes. This was definitely melted rock. Red, glowing, burning, whatever you wanted to call it: it was honest-to-goodness pure lava.

Now, there were only a select few people in the world who had the Lava Release bloodline limit, and fewer still had fire release strong enough to _melt rock_. The fact that Naruto was _clearly_ turning everything within a one-meter radius of him to _lava_ – without having mastered either fire release nor earth release – was nothing short of terrifying. Yamato rubbed his eyes to make sure that he wasn't mistaken, that all the ash in the air wasn't messing with his vision.

Yes, a few fire users could unconvincingly fake Boil Release if they were near a body of water, but lava? It took a good deal more skill to liquefy rock than it did to make a little steam.

Some idiot decided it would be a good idea to shoot a water jutsu at Naruto – _like it would help!_ – and got a faceful of boiling steam for his trouble. Right before his eyes, Yamato watched the aged sandstones of the beachside hills of Wave Country transform straight into slick black volcanic glass.

 _Lava Release straight into obsidian,_ he gasped. _This goes far beyond mere chakra combination kekkei genkai._ Perhaps it was an accident, a lucky coincidence where the temperature range and timing of the cooling happened just right –

However, when Naruto perfectly replicated the transformation, not once, but every time an enemy came at him, Yamato had to conclude that this was not a lucky accident. Naruto was very consciously and very deliberately using his Wind-style ninjutsu to control the temperature and the pressure surrounding the rock. What resulted was a whirling tornado of razor-sharp needles, falling so fast they might as well have been raining sideways.

Never before had Yamato seen someone with the ability to externally combine chakra natures in such an exact manner. It had been thought that a reproducible method to perform such techniques was impossible without a bloodline limit, and for good reason.

Bloodline limits allowed chakra mixing internally, which was easy enough because the human body was mostly homeostatic. But consistently moderating properties like temperature and pressure on earth, where it could rain, snow, or burn in the same place on any given day? Not a chance. Then there was also the critical baseline of chakra required for a successful merge. Creating steam with a fireball jutsu took a hundred times as much effort as steam from Boil Release, and even more so for lava. It was already high enough for people _with_ the bloodline limit; that level was at least seventy percent more for those _without_ from merely a theoretical standpoint, simply due to the sheer amount of energy wasted from the natural energy and friction provided by the environment – once again, substantially more than the inside of the human body.

For Naruto to be able to control the very air around him like so required an inhuman amount of multitasking and molecular-level micromanagement.

 _This could potentially rewrite everything we thought we knew about elemental combinations…_

 _The question is, is it still Naruto producing such incredible results, or the fox?_

His question was answered for him as Naruto jumped above the flames, allowing his silhouette to be visible among Yamato's dying trees for a brief second. Naruto was glowing orange and yellow, his chakra framing him in the shape of claws and fangs and pointed ears and flamelike tails, _I can see four of them; definitely four and maybe more − I swear he had barely finished up with three tails last week!_

But his eyes. They were golden-blue and framed in desperation and panic. That was not the look of a boy under the control of the Nine-Tailed Fox. That was the look of a boy who was afraid of losing his first friends ever, the look of a boy who would do anything and everything to save them, completely disregarding his own self.

This was all Kakashi's fault. Kakashi's fault, and Konoha's. _They_ did this to Naruto, to Ino and Shikamaru, drilling those self-destructive ideas into all of their children since the day they were old enough to learn what friendship meant. And now Yamato was witnessing the direct result of that impeccable "education".

 _How is he doing this?_ Yamato wondered, as the oppressive, choking air bore down on him.

And then he realized –

 _Oh, Naruto._

Why on earth did it have to be him?

Sweet, innocent, bubbly Naruto. Kindhearted, optimistic, I'm-going-to-save-the-world-and-everyone-in-it Naruto.

 _He's found his Killer Intent._

* * *

 _Wave Country: The Cave_

Ino pried her stinging jaw open and vomited onto a still-warm corpse. In the dim lighting, she sensed that it was half-transformed, killed before the full advantages of Orochimaru's curse seal could come to life. _I suppose that's one way to cut the process short._

Before her, Kakashi-sensei was ripping through all of their attackers like paper. It was chaos. It was madness. No – it should have been impossible. In a regular situation, this was the exact sort of Leeroy Jenkins idiocy he'd make Naruto sit in the corner for.

But this was not a regular situation. Their opponents might have all possessed the curse seal, but so did Kakashi-sensei.

Not the one Orochimaru had given him. That one was useless, completely deactivated.

In Ino's experience, rage was the single best and worst steroid for any ninja.

"Shikamaru," she sobbed, clawing at the dirt. "Get out of there; you have to get out of there! Sensei's thinks you're dead and he's gone absolutely _ballistic_ ; he won't stop screaming 'Obito' and I can't stop him while he's like this!"

Roughly, her head was yanked backwards, and thousands of needles of pain rocketed through her scalp. Cold metal touched her neck.

"HANDS IN THE AIR OR THE GIRLIE GETS IT!" a woman screamed. She wrapped her gnarled hand around Ino's braid and yanked it another time for good measure.

That woman had made a big mistake.

For one, no one messed with Ino Yamanaka's hair and got away with it.

" _Lightning Style,_ " she snarled, putting her hands together, " _chakra trap._ "

A thousand volts of electricity shot down her conductive locks. For a brief second, the air around her burnt with blue-white lightning – and then her captor keeled over, her heart stopped forever. Her small victory at her success was short-lived, however, for the sickly stench of burnt keratin and ozone quickly flooded the tiny cavern on top of the already heavy blanket of blood.

Ino collapsed to her knees, dry heaving. Another man flew over her head and collided with the boulder behind her. He flopped gracelessly to the ground, unconscious, but that wasn't enough, for Kakashi-sensei materialized in front of him and started _wailing_ into his face like today was the last day on earth he could punch anyone ever again. Teeth scattered like rain, some hitting Ino on the cheek.

A horrible slimy feeling crawled up and down her nerves.

 _That feels like –_

She barely had any time to consider how much she despised being a sensor before her head exploded in pure raw _orange_.

"SENSEI!" Ino screamed, trying to pass through to his brain, anything, _anything_ to calm him down, but it was no use. One look at the turmoil in there and she was ejected back out again. This was no longer about defeating Orochimaru's leftover curse seal minions; the real problem lay not in them but in the Nine-Tailed Fox. "Sensei, you have to stop now! The Kyuubi – Naruto – he's lost control! You need to snap out of it, _now_! Stop it; _stop it_ ; he's _already dead!_ "

But Kakashi-sensei was blind to the deadly glow of the rocks, to the poisonous chakra burning at their feet, to everything but his own destructive vengeance.

"KAKASHI-SENSEI!"

Ino let out a breath of relief as his body suddenly tense up mid-swing, as if paralyzed by –

 _Shikamaru._

Slowly, sluggishly, Kakashi-sensei blinked. His eyes were glazed over and dilated, and it was clear he still wasn't completely there. His leaden arms dropped to his sides, and he shook his head, drunken, waking from his trance.

"Ob…i…?"

"Shikamaru!" Ino corrected. " _Shi – ka – ma – ru!_ "

The shadow retreated back into the dirt. If it hadn't been for his familiar voice, she might have mistaken him for one of Kakashi-sensei's victims. He was still half-buried in the floor of the cavern, face poking out of the sandstone like it was a swimming pool. In spite of the pain coming from her raw, skinned, arms, Ino did her best to scratch away the hole where Shikamaru had buried himself. Kakashi-sensei was also robotically moving to help her, but the expression in his eyes showed that he was only helping her dig because she had told him to, and not because he entirely understood _why_. It was as if he still believed Shikamaru was dead, and had no idea their teammate had escaped underground.

Eventually, they managed to open up a wide enough funnel in the ground to pull Shikamaru out. He was in bad shape. The sandstone had absorbed much of the impact around his vital organs, but his shins looked flattened and bent at unnatural angles. That was the limitation of the Hiding Like a Mole technique – while the force absorbed by the rest of the stone floor prevented him from being squashed outright, it hadn't entirely dissipated all of the trauma caused by the boulder's impact.

"My head," Shikamaru grunted.

Kakashi-sensei's eyes abruptly refocused at the sound of Shikamaru's voice, and his head wildly snapped back and forth.

"Did I – was all of that − ?"

At least three-quarters of the horde was dead, and half of those dead were mutilated beyond repair. Those still alive were huddled at the far end of the cave, a few unconscious, and most so severely injured that they wouldn't make it past the next few hours.

"No," Ino said, wearing a fake smile that she knew wasn't fooling anybody. "I was responsible for that one." She pointed to the woman she had electrocuted.

Kakashi-sensei flinched. "And you…saw all of that?"

He was so scared, she realized. Scared that, after all the lengths he had gone to to protect their innocence, he himself had been the one to destroy it.

"No," Ino lied, pointing to the lump of dirt where they had pulled Shikamaru out of. "I was mostly staring at the ground." Seeing Kakashi-sensei relax so significantly, Ino didn't have the heart to foist any more emotional baggage on him. He was acting so normally, it was as if the past few minutes hadn't ever happened. But whatever was going on internally, Ino had no idea.

Besides, it wasn't strictly true that watching Kakashi-sensei's little – er, not _that_ little – tantrum was the only scary thing they would ever be exposed to in the world. More like just one more grain of sand on a growing pile, starting from their first meeting with Orochimaru up until now, and including Itachi Uchiha in Shikamaru's case.

"I think, I'm," Shikamaru gasped, spitting dirt from his mouth, "fine."

"Fine? You could have _died_ ," Kakashi-sensei hissed. "You were under there for who knows how long! Your nature might be Earth style, but even Rock nin, if knocked unconscious underground, can suffocate!"

"Sensei, we're all going to die if we don't calm Naruto down!" Ino yelled, jabbing a finger at the ceiling. "If I can feel the Kyuubi's chakra this far down, what do you think it must be like at the surface?!"

Kakashi-sensei blanched. "We need a bijuu containment seal. Fast."

Ino clenched her fists. "Can't you draw one here and then teleport up there and slap it on him?"

He shook his head. "When he's this far gone, there's enough chakra present to interact with and change the environment. There's no single set pattern I can throw around here like I can with the Hiraishin no Jutsu; every situation is different and I need direct data to figure out what sort of custom design would work for this scenario."

Shikamaru's eyes grew to the size of saucers. "So you have Naruto's chakra and the state of the environment as variables, and both of them are dependent on both each other and themselves. In order to deal with forces that facilitate their own change…your containment seal would also have to be self-modifying."

Nodding, Kakashi-sensei frantically pulled out some scrolls and drew on them with his feet. "Mentally, I can keep up. Those things you just described are just a few differential equations; I can solve those in my sleep." Ino didn't doubt him; after all, the Hiraishin no Jutsu was something similar and he'd solved that one while pulling all-nighters. "But physically, the Hiraishin no Jutsu is the most complicated seal I can set instantaneously, with my chakra. I can't draw anything more complicated beyond a linear differential system without paper and ink. The Yondaime could do things way more complicated than transcendental differential functions, I'm not that good yet."

"By the time you finish drawing that seal with your foot, it might be too late," Shikamaru said. "Let me help."

Kakashi-sensei's eyes narrowed. "You're not allowed to make mistakes. Ink is permanent."

Shikamaru whipped his shadow upwards and sent it slithering through the cracks in the roof of the cave. His mouth was pinched into a thin, determined line. "Ink is used for seals because it's a good chakra conductor. My shadow would work just as well, and when I get it to the surface, I can modify it in-place. It should be nighttime by now, and if the bushes are burning the way we left it my shadow length will be practically infinite."

"You're injured – "

"A containment seal needs to work in thirty seconds or less. I can ignore a headache and crushed feet for that long. I sense no nausea or amnesia. Hurry up, before my adrenaline rush wears off."

Ino didn't waste a second, and grabbed both Shikamaru and Kakashi-sensei by the temples. "Start thinking now," she ordered. "Whatever you do, don't stop!"

Immediately, her head was flooded with thousands of numbers and symbols as Kakashi-sensei sent Shikamaru instructions on exactly how to position and draw the seal.

Now, her job was to only transmit the end product itself. Which was harder than it sounded. She understood less than ten percent of everything Kakashi-sensei was throwing her way. The seal seemed to be this spoked wheel-looking thing with the little Uzumaki spirals around the edges. The problem was, Kakashi-sensei's brain was also being completely filled up with other symbols that were _not_ part of the seal.

 _Integral Naruto chakra pathway zero to pi over three plus integral Naruto chakra pathway pi over three to two pi over three plus integral Naruto chakra pathway two pi over three to pi summation all set equal to curl radian r equals angle open bracket close bracket..._

Considering the most complicated mathematical symbols she knew were x's and y's (the Academy didn't teach anything necessary beyond basic physics), she had a hard time figuring out if all these curly things or upside-down triangles were just backend computations, or meant to be important parts of the seal. As some minor consolation, it seemed Shikamaru was also struggling to filter out the important pieces. He was only blindly following orders, and even then it was only a matter of him being more familiar with the vocabulary than she was.

 _Integral zero to two pi Naruto chakra pathway equation directional x integral zero to two phi Naruto chakra pathway equation directional y set chakra block gate position plus and minus intersection x component zero point five five six meters plus and minus y component zero point three five meters. Integral zero to two pi total summation equation directional x integral zero to two phi Naruto chakra pathway equation directional y set chakra block gate position plus and minus intersection x component zero point five five six meters plus and minus y component zero point three five meters._

This was the process of Kakashi-sensei figuring out, as fast as he possibly could, the strongest seal that would both efficiently dissipate the excess chakra in the region, as well as shut off its source.

All of this in the span of less than a second.

Shikamaru working together with her was just barely enough to keep up; she would filter out what she obviously knew and Shikamaru took care of the more obscure stuff. And, having been friends with Shikamaru, Ino had heard the term "genius" thrown around so many times it was starting to lose meaning to her. Thinking back, Ino decided they should have at least given her some warning about what it would feel like to directly bear witness to the thoughts of a human calculator in real time.

 _Oh, gods, now Shikamaru knows his competition,_ a little sinking warning in the back of her head sighed.

Her head hurt so much. Her mind was straining from the information overload. She was still too inexperienced with their family technique; she couldn't do this; she could feel her nose bleeding _– no, focus! I'm fine!_ she snapped, as the flow of thought streaming to her trickled down to a bunch of "are you okay" statements. _Shikamaru, Kakashi-sensei, get back to the task at hand and don't you dare worry about me!_

The cavern rippled.

Kakashi-sensei shivered. _Distraction error first quadrant collapsed imminent fix required._

 _See, I told you! Don't let your attention waver!_ Ino ordered. _I can take it! This is too important to make mistakes on!_

And so it went. Ino watched the work from both ends, both Kakashi-sensei's mental graphs and Shikamaru's real-time translations. She saw Shikamaru's shadow, stretched out into a thin thread, curling and twisting into the exact shape of the loops and swirls and kanji that the jumping numbers in Kakashi-sensei's head ordered. She felt her arms and nerves and brain burn from the sheer speed of the transmissions. She felt her chakra pathways burn from the pain that Naruto – her poor, kind friend – was radiating everywhere, and _Gods, I should have just let him come with us. I should have never split us up in the first place._

Ino held her breath.

Slowly, but surely, the inside of the cavern cooled, and the heavy slime retreated from her spine.

It was like the entire world was breathing one collective sigh of relief, as the pressure they didn't even know was all over the air completely lifted. Where there was once awful, poisonous heat, she only felt the cool, clammy subterranean air.

"Oh thank goodness," Ino whispered. Her arms felt boneless; her skeleton was made of jelly, too weak to support her weight.

Her cheek met the warm stone floor.

"Make sure to take the ones who are still alive for questioning," she mumbled, unsure if anyone could properly hear her last orders. "Those guys," she gestured, in a halfhearted effort to repeat herself. "We have to find out who sent them."

Then there was nothing but the agony in her skull and the pounding in her ears.

* * *

 _Wave Country: the Cliffs_

Naruto blinked. The orange was gone. He struggled, his feet glued to the ground; the paralysis lasted for several more seconds before he felt the locks on his hands and feet finally recede.

Was that writing on the ground? It looked like the strange shapes that Kakashi-sensei liked to draw in the dirt when he was bored and wanted to practice his sealing. No, it was a shadow. But in the shape of a seal. A seal made from a shadow, and not from ink. _Shikamaru's gotten really good at manipulating his shadow into complex shapes,_ Naruto thought. And then, _Shikamaru. He must be alive. And so Ino and Kakashi-sensei might be, too, wherever they are!_

He wanted to jump and smile in happiness, but a prickling sense of unease stopped him in his tracks. Experimentally, he opened and closed his hands. They were sticky and crumbly. He brought his fingers up to feel his cheeks. They were caked in something, something that was definitely not mud.

His feet. His clothes. His everything.

 _Definitely not mud._

Yamato was standing there, face blackened, lips cracked, eyes dry, regarding him with a fearful look in his eyes.

 _Gee, I wonder why?_ the fox drawled.

 _Shut UP!_ Naruto snapped, eyes widening as he fully realized just exactly what had transpired. He dropped to his hands and knees, panting, eyelids squeezed tightly shut in a futile attempt escape the horrid truth surrounding him. Sharp shards of smoky glass cut the thick cloth on his pants and pierced his palms in hundreds of little points, but Naruto could hardly feel them. The pain they caused him were mere pinpricks in comparison to the awful truth.

 _Blame it on me all you like, but at the end of the day, you know whose fault this_ really _was,_ the fox told him, and Naruto was unable to stifle the little sob that escaped his parched throat.

This was all him. All of it.

The nasty, decomposed smell of the seafood ramen from earlier was nothing compared to the burning stench of flesh and ash. Naruto felt the contents of his stomach rise in his throat. Everything as far as he could see was nothing but pitch black charcoal dust. Death and destruction and body parts, all of it. Everything, except for himself, and the midnight blue sky, the one place he hadn't stained with his darkness.

The moon and the stars had never looked so beautiful.

Naruto started to cry.

* * *

 **A/N: Sorry for the long wait...four exams scheduled within the same week. Thanks so much for being patient, guys; I tried to get this one out as fast as I could. Constructive criticism would be appreciated on this one as I didn't spend as much time editing it as I normally do.**


	45. A Candle in the Wind

BONUS #38

 _[www] fanfiction [dotnet] /forum/The-Chiaroscuro-Effect/185326/_

* * *

 _Wave Country_

It was completely dark by the time we finally managed to reach the earth's surface again. And just as well, too, for daylight would have surely illuminated the full extent of the damages we had caused. Given that being a ninja implied a certain level of discretion in every action, the entire highly large and obvious swath of scorched earth was somewhat embarrassing.

At least this had been the uninhabited area of Wave. So we had no civilian casualties. Apart from, well, the non-shinobi pickpockets that we were meant to clear out anyway.

 _Ino's going to be so upset when she finds out. They were only stealing to survive; she never wanted to kill them._

People like Naruto or Ino shouldn't ever have been allowed to experience death, not even a little bit. I didn't care about myself, much. But they were such empathetic people. In any other profession, I should have wished to be like them.

But there was nothing we could do except keep an eye on our living captives. The rest of the corpses – the ones we could find, anyhow – we packed away into sealing scrolls to bring back to Konoha for medical research.

Perhaps we'd get special missions involving mass destruction sometime in the future. Shinobi were known to be hired for that on occasion. Burning down entire mansions, spray-painting specific graffiti on strategically placed walls, creating and distributing propaganda, destroying whole organizations from the inside out (these were all real examples of missions that had been requested and assigned) – those tasks were impossible to complete sneakily. Client demands were varied and fickle things, and politicians especially liked to employ such outlandish tactics to _send a message_ ; they were, after all, quite effective.

Sending a blatant message hadn't been a specific part of the description for this particular job, but here was a message from us all the same.

 _TEAM 7 WAS HERE!_

Like how everything was bigger in Tanyu, everything was more dangerous in the shinobi world, including graffiti.

 _Especially_ graffiti.

 _God, this hurts_ … Both Kakashi-sensei and Yamato knew basic healing, enough to keep someone alive while they waited for a more capable medic, but there was little anyone could do for me apart from some painkillers and chakra replenishers.

It must have been fifteen minutes at most, but it felt like an hour. Eventually, the sole remaining team stationed in our Wave base made it to our location. There used to be more, but most had since been recalled to Konoha. The Hokage wasn't dumb or greedy enough to renege his promise about slowly withdrawing our forces from Wave once the impoverished country got back on their feet.

Considering we already had some extremely advantageous trade agreements with them, there was little profit to be had in spending extra time, men, and money on an extended occupation – certainly not worth enough to sully our pristine image and garner the animosity of the locals, a la the formerly alive Gato (with emphasis on _formerly_ ). Besides, recent infiltrations and foreign tensions meant that we needed every hand we could get for village defense.

"What the _heck_ happened here?" a familiar, harsh voice rang out. "It looks like the Sage of Six Paths farted into a lighter!"

Oh, _joy_. It was our angry Chunin examiner.

"Good to see you too, Masa-san. Watch where you step," Yamato warned, pointing to the shards of obsidian still lodged all over the ground.

"By the way, both our resident Yamanaka and Nara have _head injuries_ ," Kakashi-sensei added. Underneath the sarcasm I could hear his voice shaking. "So if you guys have a medic, now would be a good time for them to _get over here_."

Said medic, a woman in her early forties by the name of Seki Juuji, was thankfully experienced enough to remain calm. "Minor concussion, a bunch of broken bones, and some rather severe internal injury, but nothing I can't fix," she said. Under her palms, my cracked shins came back together, not without a great deal of pain as the bone fragments realigned themselves. "But you'll need leg braces for the next few weeks to ensure they heal straight; there's only so much I can do. You'll be as good as new in a month, tops, _if_ you rest up properly."

"And Ino," Kakashi-sensei reminded her.

"She'll be fine," she told us, running her green chakra over Ino's forehead. "Nothing seriously broken, so she won't require casts. Anything else I should know about?"

"Some superficial cuts and burns for me, but I packed salve and bandages. Same for Hatake," Yamato said.

"And that boy over there?" she asked, jerking her chin at Naruto, who was curled up on himself, face blank and eyes unfocused, silent as a grave.

"Physically fine, except for a bunch of glass in his palms, knees, and toes, but…"

Seki hummed sympathetically. "First time?"

"And second, and third, and…let's just say, the explosion took out a lot of guys all at once," Yamato explained. "Actually, more than a lot."

"Mmmm. Happens to everyone, young or old, inexperienced or veteran. Mostly it's caused by stressful battles like this one, but I once knew a guy who got a spike case simply from cabin fever. We were locked in this muddy underground bunker for months in Amegakure during a siege from that last world war," she explained. Taking another look at Naruto, she pursed her lips. "He's a bit young, though."

"Generally, thirteen-year-olds don't have to fight curse seal enhanced men twice their age," I couldn't help but snark.

I had read about spike cases before, though this was more Ino's area of expertise than mine. Generally, when they happened while in the field, it was dangerous; people who couldn't think or stay hidden could easily give away positions of other members and compromise missions. Every member of a team needed to be alert and ready, all the time.

But how could Naruto have known? It wasn't fair for us to blame him; all the responsibility lay with our attackers.

"Nnngh," Ino groaned, blinking. "You guys okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, they're all fine," Masa interrupted. "Now explain to me what kind of job you've been doing here? Did you learn _nothing_ about stealth your entire time in – "

Ino straightened up and stared him in the eye. Her chin lifted, and she put one challenging hand on her hip – wonderful. And – yep, there it was. An unimpressed curve of the eyebrow. Ino was not in a good mood, and when Ino was not in a good mood, anyone who valued their ego had better get out of the way.

"How about, instead of asking _us_ that, _you_ explain what kind of job you'vebeen doing here? Because I specifically remember being told that all _trained shinobi_ not loyal to Konoha had already been cleared out of the area. Our mission was dealing with civilian-level petty criminals, not artifically enhanced bio-freaks! Look _around_ you, _Jonin-sama_ ," Ino snapped, pointing to the visible curse seals on our surviving captives. "Does that look like a loyal Konoha nin to you?"

Her voice cracked and her hands trembled. I could see her trying to ignore everyone else who was dead, dead, or deader than dead.

Masa Shi What's-His-Face looked murderous. "Don't get cocky with me, girl. I remember you. You were one of those rookie brats. Looks like you haven't learned respect, either – though given your sensei, I'm not surprised," the man spat. Then, he processed Ino's words about non-Konoha shinobi. "Wait, is that − ?"

"Oh, full marks!" Ino crossed her arms, angry and sad and completely unrepentant about taking it all out on the grown man shamefully shrinking in front of her. "And I have to say − seeing as we successfully completed our mission in _spite_ of _your_ failure, this level of collateral damage is insignificant in comparison. Stealth was the _least_ of our problems here. Unless you mean to tell us that we failed a mission we weren't even assigned, in some big cosmic joke."

Well, the insignificance of said collateral damage was an arguable point, but a good enough bluff done with the right attitude (and Ino had plenty of _that_ ) would suffice.

Seki smirked. "She got you there, Masa."

"Shut up; there's three of us for this entire island," Masa muttered. His scowl had become a worried frown. "How many did you say there were?"

"At least fifty-two," Kakashi-sensei answered him.

"At least?"

"I was a bit busy killing my way to survival, thanks for asking." The anger in Kakashi-sensei's eyes could murder a man. "Let's make this clear: if any one of my teammates _had_ died down there, do you understand exactly _what_ I would have done to collect on that debt?"

Shi Masa paled. "And just when we had finished taking care of Kumo." He shook his head. "You don't think that's all of them?"

I shrugged. "We won't know until we interrogate them."

Ino put both her hands up in the air. "I'm not doing anything until I get the rest of my chakra back. As the team captain for this mission, I hereby declare that we leave this place now."

* * *

Ino hated death. Training for her clan technique required becoming more perceptive to the thoughts and emotions of others, and it was uncomfortable knowing that someone's mind and personality could just _disappear_ so easily. When she had been very young, she remembered _feeling_ her old grandmother slip away – as had her father, and any other Yamanaka in the room at the time.

She had gotten used to it, but that didn't mean it ever got better.

Why did their world always have to be like this? People were always fighting with and lying to one another. She had been trained by her family and her teacher to prepare for this – all this violence and pointless killing and betrayal – but sometimes, sometimes she just wondered – what would the world be like if none of this happened? If the truth was just presented as it was, straight and good and honest. If people could work in harmony, instead of jealously plotting and scheming to sabotage their friends behind their backs all the while wearing a front of complete unbreakable innocence?

All of this, and for what?

Ino was so _tired_ of it. And yet she couldn't stop and rest. Shinobi weren't ever allowed to stop and rest, or else they'd get run over. For some reason she had been born, and so she'd have to grit her teeth and make the best of the cards she'd been dealt.

For a group of kids who weren't even officially Chunin yet, they seemed to get into a great deal of unnecessary trouble.

"At least we're alive," Shikamaru tried to say. "And we finished the mission. We're all alive, is the important part."

Finished the mission. Of course they finished the mission. Their orders had been to clear out the thugs, and as a bunch of civilian pickpockets were unlikely to have high informational value, "capture alive" had not been included in the instructions. That had been her own thing.

If they had wanted to, Ino could have simply teamed up with Naruto to burn down the thieves' hideout from a distance, had Shikamaru use some earth or water jutsu to put out the fire before it spread, and hightailed it out of there. Or, better yet, have Naruto use his air jutsu to blow a cloud of poison into the vents. Easy as pie.

Any of those options would have also solved the "problem" and completed the mission without violating any of their given mission parameters. No thugs meant no crime, no crime meant a happier Wave Country, a happier Wave Country meant more support for Fire Country, and more support for Fire Country implied good things for Konoha. Killing everyone in that warehouse would have achieved the same results as taking them alive.

In the grand scheme of things, a few corpses were insignificant little details. Grouped into the much less humanizing label of collateral damage. The only implicit order ninja were ever given was to minimize "accidents", because if they got the reputation for having too many civilian casualties, no one would want to hire them.

But Ino wasn't one to think about some other person's life as an unimportant little detail, even if they _were_ just some nameless thief or robber from another country. It went against her innate belief that everything mattered. After all, her clan technique operated on the consciousnesses of other beings, and if something didn't matter, why would it have a consciousness? Why would any of them be given consciousnesses, for that matter? Of all the billions of people in the world, of all the billion billion trillion whatever _possible_ people that could have been, why _them_? They were important. They mattered.

Death – a flying kunai, a bit of poison, too much water or too little oxygen, a tiny infected wound, a stab to the wrong place – was cheap. Life – was not. Life was something that took time and effort to build, and it was something that could be easily swept away in a single moment of chaos, like a house of cards collapsing under the tiniest bump of a table. Ino was many things, but she was not some mindless heartless murdering machine, even if wearing her hitai-ate automatically meant that she would branded with the label of "shinobi."

"Ino. How's the head?" Kakashi-sensei asked.

She grinned. "Okay, but if I have to do that again, my brain might melt."

"I don't doubt it. That was a really complex sealing job even _I'm_ scared of attempting on a good day, and both of you were injured at the time. That was nothing short of incredible."

"How's yours?"

Kakashi-sensei winced. "I haven't had such a bad relapse in awhile. No doubt the Sandaime's going to force me to go see some ANBU therapist."

"You could talk to me."

"They're going to make you have your first psychological checkups around this time, too. It's probably just going to be your father."

Ino nodded. Why did blood and deceit have to be so _normal_? Why didn't people just realize that getting along was so much easier than not getting along? It didn't take much energy to verbally voice disagreement – but sending thousands of men out into the field, planning for wars, forming spy networks – wasn't that so much harder?

Why didn't those old men all just sit down and have a real, heart-to-heart talk with one another? Ino could imagine it now – her, playing psychologist to all the most important politicians in the land, and treating each and every one of them to a nice good verbal smackdown every time one of them tried to be dishonest or catty. Because that was what they all were – gossipy teenage girls, only on a grander scale.

It would certainly save them all the this trouble – hanging out in Wave country, constantly wondering what would happen next, if the political plots that weren't supposed to concern them actually did end up concerning them after all.

Naruto still hadn't talked.

"Wait," Ino said. "I take that back. We're not leaving yet."

She prepared herself for questions. _Can't it wait until we get back to Konoha?_ or some variation of that. But everyone only shrugged. "Okay."

"That means you too, Naruto."

Naruto flinched. _That's a reaction, at least._

"I mean it, buster. Sit down."

Naruto sat.

Even without her mind transfer, she could still all the internal screaming going on behind his glassy stare. _No get away from me what if I lose control again − I'm not the same person you thought I was − what if you get hurt because of me_ _– I'm not the same person_ I _thought I was –_

Ino crouched down next to him, latching firmly onto his sleeve before he could scoot away and wrapping him in a tight hug.

 _He never got enough of them growing up, and back then I was too wrapped up in my own silly little problems to care._

"I killed someone, too," she whispered, running her hand through his hair, trying to smooth down his perpetually untameable spikes like she had done so many times before. Her fingers deftly ran through the tangles in those wild yellow straws, trying in vain to bring some semblance of order to what was otherwise a hopeless realm of chaos.

A year ago, none of them could have possibly imagined themselves sitting here like this. But a year ago, they were still stupid kids in the Academy. Playing pranks and fawning over boys. Their lives revolved around how excited they were to finally be able to go out there like the big shots in the village and do S-ranks and beat up some bad guys. _I killed someone,_ she thought, _because I judged their life to be less than mine and that of my friends._

 _I don't have that right to judge a stranger's life to be less than my own._

Naruto's seemingly unflappable confidence and happiness was a true side of him, she didn't doubt that. But his personal insecurities, like his fear of abandonment, was also a part of him. Only, he had hidden that side of him with the stronger side for so long that now even the people who knew him thought that his magical friendship gun was all there was to him.

And while his sunny personality drew many people to him, it also left them not knowing what to do when it burned out.

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry, _I'm sorry_ …"

" _Shhh_ ," Ino whispered. "It's over."

 _But had I not killed her, it would have been one of my friends._

 _And I don't have the right to judge my friends' life to be less than a stranger's, either._

"It wasn't the killing. It wasn't the fox either. It was _me_. I couldn't stop doing it; it was like I _wanted_ the killing, I _wanted_ to hurt them, and I'm scared of myself, I don't want to – " he choked. "I'm used to people calling me a monster behind my back, but it was easy for me to ignore them because I could blame everything on the fox and tell myself that they were only being ignorant and that they didn't know how the bijuu seals worked but – "

Ino finally abandoned her task of rearranging Naruto's hair into something more presentable – it had been a lost cause from the start, anyway, and growled, "You're not a monster, Naruto. You're just _Naruto_.They were trying to kill us. They were trying to kill _you_." Her voice was low and angry and _dangerous_. "I don't care what happens to me. But _no one_ messes with this team on my watch. _No one_."

No one was perfect. Everyone had a colder side to them. The cruel, aggressive, apathetic side that surfaced when they were in a bad mood, or were too tired to socialize, or sometimes for no reason at all. And everyone was _allowed_ to have this side – everyone except Naruto. For Ino, her little mistakes, her childish "I hate you's", her petty incidents of rumour-mill bullying, were easily forgiven by the next day. But Naruto didn't have that luxury; because of the fox, even one misstep would result in disproportionate reactions from the rest of the village.

Naruto had dealt with that by surrounding himself in purposeful obliviousness, she understood now. His book smarts had taken a hit because of a lack of foundation, but his street smarts had always been there. He had always been observant, with a reasonably high lateral thinking ability. But he'd shut that part of himself off, because it was easier to be an idiot than read the atmosphere and realize everyone hated you, to feign ignorance for a little bit of bliss. Just like he had rejected the darker side of him, even though it was still there and would definitely fester into something much worse if he didn't find a healthy way to let it out.

 _You don't have to be a hero all the time. You should be allowed to be the bad guy every once in a while, and have people understand._

She looked him in the eyes once more. There was something hard there, something that she had never seen before, something that she couldn't quite place – but it was something that she felt, too. She didn't know what it was; she couldn't put a name to it. It was not a happy feeling. But it was a _strong_ feeling, and she figured that was good enough.

* * *

 _Konoha_

Kakashi had grown used to killing long before the age of thirteen, but they weren't _him_ and he hoped to god that they were smarter than to view _him_ as a _role model_ in terms of mental stability. For all that he wished to teach them his skill, he _never_ wanted to pass on any of his behavior.

He closed his eyes. Obito's empty eye socket kept staring up at him over and over again. He had thought, naively, when he was assigned this generation of Team 7, that he could leave the last one behind him. After all, their presence had closed those old wounds.

He should have known that wasn't the same as said trauma never happening. His mind was no longer bleeding, but the scars were still there.

 _And now more on top of that,_ he thought mirthlessly. It didn't matter if they were skilled shinobi. Things like this shouldn't have been happening to them. They were too young for it. They would _always_ be too young for _everything_. For all their skill, for all he had trained them to do – from capturing escaped cats and criminals to building houses and military outposts while under fire – he never wanted to see them in any of those situations. An impossible hope, but one he clung to because he had no choice.

"I bet they're going to be really mad at me," Naruto mumbled.

Kakashi flicked the back of his head. "No, they're not. It's fine. I'll tell them I did it. It wouldn't be the first time."

Naruto shot him a look that asked, _You really think the Hokage's going to buy that?_

Kakashi shrugged. It was rare that anyone could lie to the Hokage without him knowing. Convincing him to turn a blind eye to a few alternative facts on official paperwork, however, was significantly easier.

How could something like this have happened? Well – he already _knew_ ; he wouldn't blame any of them for developing Killer Intent in response to _each other_. _Killer Intent_ in Naruto, at that. _I was pegging Shikamaru to be the first one. The gods just love to laugh at me, don't they?_ he thought. _I ask for my students to take my lessons on teamwork to heart, and they did exactly as I asked._

 _More than I asked._

 _To the point where they would be willing to kill for each other._

It took all of his self control to keep him from turning around and destroying something right then and there.

 _I forced them to run laps so they wouldn't get tired when fleeing for their lives. I forced them to spar so that they would be able to hold their own in a fight. Was there anything else I could have done, to numb them to the killing so they wouldn't −_

 _I didn't do it because I_ knew _something like this would have happened and damn it, all of these excuses were just because I didn't want to see Naruto stop smiling because of something_ I _did and look where that got him – spike case in the middle of a mission and_ damn _it, I'm never good enough, how the hell did_ you _manage to do it, Minato-sensei –_

If Minato-sensei had been there, he would have told him something corny and sappy like "Do whatever feels right to you, Kakashi."

 _Corny and sappy but not necessarily stupid…_

On instinct, his hands strayed to his pockets, and when they came away he was holding an old scroll in his hands.

"Here, Naruto. Hold on to this for me until we get back to Konoha."

"Sensei, I – huh?"

"Something to make you feel better." Kakashi smiled. "I've always found dogs to be superior to any shrink."

"But sensei – " Naruto picked up the faded paper and inhaled sharply. "This is your family's summoning contract."

Kakashi smiled. "What family do I need besides you guys?"

His Hatake ancestors would probably make his afterlife hell for this, but Kakashi didn't care. Seeing the joy return to Naruto's face was entirely worth it.

* * *

 **A/N: Naruto is the most obvious with his emotions, which is what helps him get everything out and bounce back quickly.**

 **Kakashi and Shikamaru are both the type to fool themselves into thinking they're okay when they're really not.**

 **Ino is somewhere in the middle – she understands the importance of letting it all out, but at the same time, she feels pressured to be the reliable parent figure of the team (since Kakashi is obviously unfit for that post). So while normally, she'd be like Naruto, she just as quickly shoves aside her own troubles when she sees someone else in need.**


	46. As Clear As Water

_Konoha_

Hiruzen glanced over the team that returned home to him, horribly battered and dead-eyed. It was supposed to be an easy one, too. How had dealing with a few pickpockets gone so badly wrong? Well, obviously, he knew why; they had just given him the report, after all…it was more of a rhetorical complaint to the random number gods.

"You don't know how relieved I am that you came home alive – "

"Actually, I do," Kakashi said shortly.

Not a good mood, then. The Sandaime made a mental note to have Kakashi watched. Things rarely ended well when he got into one of his slumps. There had been a rock – always bad news, rocks – and no one was quite sure where it came from. The easiest solution had been to blame one of Orochimaru's minions; it was quite plausible, after all, that many of them knew earth jutsu and the one responsible for the earthquake had been killed in the crossfire.

"What are you planning to do about it?" Ino cut in. Straight to the point, this one.

The Sandaime wasn't quite sure himself. This wasn't the first case of battle frenzy in the world, not by a long shot, and most of them had been for worse reasons than concern for one's friends. Then again, Naruto Uzumaki wasn't most people, and while any one random berserker wouldn't cause too many problems in the aftermath, an out-of-control jinchuuriki could kill hundreds of enemies and allies alike in a single moment. If word of this got out, anyone could use this event as an excuse, that Naruto was too unstable and dangerous to be part of the regular forces…

"It wasn't the Kyuubi," Naruto whispered.

"I'm sorry?"

"I lost control of my emotions, but I had full control of my power. I take responsibility for my actions. I attribute it to my inexperience in tactical planning. If we are ever in a situation outside of mission parameters again, I will do my best to make more efficient choices," Naruto explained blandly. "This won't happen again."

"I'd like to mention that while all those other guys got burnt to a crisp, I got away with minor burns even though I was standing within the same radius. That means even in his haze, he was still aware enough to keep his allies in mind, subconsciously or not," Yamato added. "And if you think about it, that's some pretty impressive control right there, being able to kill someone within ten meters without hurting a teammate standing within five."

Hiruzen blinked. Well, that was one way of getting around it.

"Right. Here's what we're going to do. Since Yamato was the only one who actually witnessed this with his own eyes, we are going to say that Naruto overjudged the powers of his opponents because he mistakenly believed Orochimaru was nearby. However, he gained his first experience in successfully controlling his bijuu powers outside of a training setting as a result."

Naruto blinked at him. "Old man – "

"Meanwhile, I am granting Team 7 permission for one month of training leave."

"Probation, you mean."

 _Naruto's getting too smart._ "On paper, it is training leave which you yourself requested, as well as time for your injured teammates to heal themselves properly. It is a common enough occurrence during peacetime. Respectable shinobi take breaks to teach themselves new jutsu all the time. It is a mere coincidence that the jutsu you have set your heart on requires a great deal of training in control."

Naruto blinked again. Then, he swallowed. "Yes, sir."

"I trust nothing will leave this room?"

Kakashi narrowed his eyes. "If it does, you can bet your stupid hat it wasn't one of us."

* * *

 _Training Ground Three_

"By the way – fair warning, before you disappoint yourself – the first dog you summon won't come out completely sentient and full-grown like Pakkun or Bull. It will take a while before you get anything other than a puppy."

"It's fine. I like puppies," Naruto answered.

"I take it you're happy with this choice of animal?" Kakashi-sensei asked.

Happy? Naruto was beside himself. "Yeah – it's awesome."

"That's a relief, because Naruto, you're the only member of this team with enough chakra and a good enough tracking ability to work with my ninken. Initially, we were planning on further developing your elemental combination abilities in addition to your training with Jiraiya, but I thought it would be better if you got a break."

Naruto nodded. "So how does this work?"

"I'll show you how to set up and sign the contracts later; you can start practicing your summoning then. But first, we have to figure out what to do with you two," Kakashi-sensei said, looking at Shikamaru and Ino. "Shikamaru – due to your injuries, you're exempt from any taxing physical activity for the next few weeks. I've found a different use of your time instead. Now that we've figured out that you _can_ use your own shadows as a substitute for fuinjutsu ink, it would be foolish to let such a powerful and unique tool go to waste."

Shikamaru sat up excitedly. "I'm learning sealing?"

Kakashi-sensei's eye crinkled, which Naruto immediately took to mean _uh-oh_.

"Yes, you are. It's a very difficult field, which is why I'm going to give it to you – because I know, if anyone is intelligent enough to succeed at it, it's you. As such, here is your homework for the rest of forever," Kakashi-sensei said, dumping a very _thick_ portfolio into Shikamaru's lap.

"That looks…incredibly time-consuming," Ino said. "And emotionally taxing."

"Yes, but I have faith that Shikamaru will be able to deal with it," Kakashi-sensei smiled.

There was this little glint in Shikamaru's eye that said he was in a very good mood for the words _challenge accepted_ today.

Knowing him, that meant he'd have it done by the end of the week.

"Isn't this dangerous to learn on your own, though?"

"For the idiots with terrible handwriting who are trying to paint their own exploding tags without supervision at home, sure. But that's not what we're doing here. It's a bit like studying a new language. The difference is building up your grammar, syntax, vocabulary, and idioms before attempting to put together sentences, as opposed to walking blindly into a foreign nation, shouting gibberish and making a fool of yourself. Judging by your learning style, you'd do better trying to figure it out for yourself, but don't be afraid to ask me to walk you through something if you need help."

There was a little smirk playing at the corners of Shikamaru's lips. "Like messy handwriting? Don't worry, sensei; I've dealt with a lot worse."

"Really?" Kakashi-sensei asked, intrigued.

Shikamaru looked like he was about to explain, but then he cut himself off. "I'm not telling you, if you're going to use it as an example."

"Too smart for me," Kakashi-sensei sighed. "Oh, well. Unless you mean your father – in which case, don't worry; I'm not _that_ irresponsible."

Shikamaru sighed. "You got me."

"Why? What does your dad do?" Naruto asked.

"He's so lazy, that he regularly doesn't even bother to finish writing out the entire word, and ends up putting down this sorry half-formed excuse of a character instead. He's smart enough to remember what _he's_ writing about – the symbols he writes down are just things to trigger his memory with – but, of course, other people reading his writing aren't as familiar with the context," Shikamaru explained. "Useful for cryptography, when it's deliberately done – but extremely annoying in personal letters since I'm usually the person people go to when they can't find him, or when he's asleep, which is all the time."

"Oh," Naruto laughed, despite himself, remembering some of the other stories Shikamaru had told them about his father. He couldn't help it – the thought that Konoha's Jonin Commander would rather just put another roll of toilet paper on top of the preexisting tube instead of actually opening the dispenser to replace it, just like he did sometimes, was too funny.

"And last but not least: Ino," said Kakashi-sensei. "As your chakra nature is fire, learning lightning manipulation as the next step won't be too difficult. If you can do that thing with your hair, other techniques should not be much of an issue."

Ino nodded, and accepted his little scheduling slip. Naruto couldn't see it from where he was sitting, but it seemed _really_ detailed. He could see her eyes darting rapidly across the training regimen Kakashi-sensei had come up for her, and more than once her face crinkled in a slight wince. No doubt she was already feeling the pain of what Kakashi-sensei was going to put her through. As a multiple-time victim of his sensei's unusual combat tactics, Naruto could vouch for exactly how well they worked.

"Ino, if you want to wait for me to finish up with Naruto, we can start our first training session right after this. And Shikamaru, I'll see you later – I trust you'll be fine on your own, yes?"

"That sounds reasonable," Shikamaru said, already completely engrossed in the sealing notes Kakashi-sensei had given him.

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

I was practically skipping past our front doors, ecstatic beyond belief. This wasn't any old sealing textbook. This was the culmination of knowledge from modern sealing masters like Jiraiya. And considering how so much information of similar calibre had been destroyed in Uzushiogakure generations ago, you can understand how big of a deal this was for me.

My excitement distracted me to the point where, while running to my room, I nearly tripped over my father, who was lying in the middle of the living room floor with a manila folder opened over his face.

"Ugggh," he groaned.

"What's going on?" I asked.

"Performance reviews are coming up. _Aw man…_ I don't want to do this…so much paperwork…I hate these Jonin applications so much…" He rolled over and mumbled incoherently about personal statements into the floorboards.

Right. The Jonin evaluations.

The Jonin trials were different from the Chunin exams in that there wasn't some big test that any yahoo with a teacher recommendation could sign up for and maybe pass. Watching a bunch of Genin duke it out in a big stadium? Fine. But no one smart would throw a big fancy tournament to brag about the secret powers and techniques of their elites to the world.

So the Jonin exam was less of an exam and more of a really hard technical interview in front of a board consisting of the Hokage, the Jonin Commander (that is, my father), and any other number of important figures.

But of course, important people were busy ones, so they could only test a limited amount of candidates. Really, the hard part wasn't passing the evaluation (which was pretty high standard already), but getting one in the first place. They only gave time slots to people who were sure not to waste their time. Couldn't use up the Hokage's waking hours on guys with no chance, after all.

There were the basic requirements, like having completed at least a set number of A-ranks and B-ranks, having a 95% mission pass rate within the last five years, having a clear health and psychological profile, that sort of thing. But after that, it was a bit of a toss-up. There was a very stringent baseline for what it took to be Jonin-level, one that couldn't be expressed solely on paper. That was why those with well-known names and impressive missions on file were more likely to get a slot, and thus, a chance at a promotion.

So it was really important for regular guys like Izumo and Kotetsu, whose resumes weren't brimming with standout achievements (in comparison to _my_ team, which managed to increase our mission difficulties by at least one grade every time we left the village), to get a direct "in".

 _Izumo and Kotetsu, right._

"I know – why don't you let me help you," I said, putting my sealing homework down. Oh, but I wanted to get started on it so badly! _But I already promised Izumo and Kotetsu that I'd help them…_ Was this bribery? Corruption? Yeah, probably. But I bribed them first. And I wasn't _giving_ them the promotion; just the opportunity. If they blew it in front of the Hokage, then it was on them. "Just tell me what makes you immediately filter an application out and I'll help you sort through those."

He yawned. "Spelling and grammar errors anywhere. The personal statement only has room for 150 characters, so if they can't even pay attention to detail there that's a bad sign for the field," he listed, ticking off his fingers as he went. "If there is a vague or flowery sentence like 'I am a good leader' or 'I care about my subordinates' without a concrete example from the field, toss it. If their letter of recommendation comes from a friend instead of a superior and is similarly bad, toss it – that just means that they're trying to cover up their absolute lack of substance."

Some of the chunin and tokujo in the pile I recognized, like Hana Inuzuka and Anko Mitarashi. Most of them, I barely knew, having heard their names while working in the mission office but not talking to them enough to accurately assess their skill. As I continued reading out names, my father would give a few comments, ranging from "nowhere near good enough yet" to "ready for promotion in a technical sense but waiting wouldn't hurt".

Some Chunin were ready for Tokubetsu Jonin but not full Jonin; and some Tokubetsu Jonin were still too overly specialized. Some were mentally ready but did not have the combat skills; others were the opposite, Jonin-level fighters who were still too hotheaded or lacking in leadershsip experience. Still others were passed up solely because they were young, and, as no war had been officially declared yet, there was no point in speed promotions.

Finally, I got to Izumo Kamizuki's. Thankfully, his form-filling skills passed my father's basic standards, so I wouldn't have to explain to him later that I was unable to get him a performance review because of a typo. "I think this guy might be good."

"Izumo Kamizuki? You really think so?"

I shrugged. "I had to spend a lot of time with him during that period of time where we were doing nothing but paperwork missions. He's not as dumb as he acts."

My father smiled. "We seem to have a lot of those people in Konoha."

I grinned back, and thought of Naruto. "That we do."

Eventually, we finished, and I was finally able to retreat to my room and start my real training. Decades' worth of faded paper and ink, barely legible diagrams and smudged data. I closed my eyes and inhaled the musty smell. This was perfect.

Even before studying the content in detail, I was already learning a great deal of interesting things about the authors of these works simply from the marginalia. Such as how Kakashi-sensei was a complete liar when he claimed he was incapable of writing more neatly, or how Jiraiya was quite fond of doodling stick figure comics to illustrate his points, or how the Fourth Hokage habitually wrote himself reminders of daily life right next to his research logs, as if this work took up so much of his life that all other things became peripheral side thoughts.

It probably did.

 _Reminder: Kushina's birthday tomorrow, invite her to Ichiraku's?_

 _Pick up dry cleaning 3:30 pm_

 _Eggs, onions, rice cakes (?)_

 _Proofread Jiraiya's book later_

 _Ask after C-ranks for Kashi-chan_

Wait – Kashi-chan?

There's only one person in Konoha with those syllables in his name. _Huh. That makes sense, why they chose to have him learn the Flying Thunder God technique of all people._

Though, it was incredibly weird to think of Kakashi-sensei when he was still young enough to be called Kashi-chan. Considering just how much effort he put into surrounding his personality in an aura of trollish mystery, getting to know that particular piece of history was the equivalent of watching the planets align. Simply hearing him honestly talk about himself in any way was a gold mine. And, I supposed, the Yondaime too, who I was only just starting to consider almost-human. Had to keep up the appearance of ghostly-legendary-figures and all that.

I tried to picture Kakashi-sensei at six years old, short and round-faced, still in the process of losing baby teeth and yet already brandishing weapons and demanding C-ranks. It was both sad and hilarious at the same time.

Those two things seemed to come in pairs a lot.

* * *

 _The REAL Kirigakure_

Mei Terumi was not happy, and so by default Ao was not, either.

"Explain to me again _how_ we were wrong!"

"I don't know _how_ we were wrong!" Ao snapped. "I just know that we _are_!"

"How _can_ we be wrong?!" Mei yelled back, her voice cracking. "The Sanbi! The girl that died! Was she or was she not _Rin Nohara_!"

"She was," Chojuro whispered. "I swear to you, we double-checked _everything_. It was definitely her. Of all the conflicts we have had with Konoha in history, hers is the only case in living memory with at least one of the involved parties still alive. But even if it _wasn't_ her, Kakashi Hatake was definitely there that night. I managed to find the ANBU containment cell they were holding her in that night, and there's a big black electrical burn mark on the walls where they replaced the lock."

"Exactly!" Mei crowed. "Kakashi Hatake is her only surviving teammate. If even _we've_ heard his own comrades call him a 'vindictive little shit' all the way out here in our literal backwater, you _know_ the stories about him being insane enough to do something like this are serious!"

"Well, it _can't_ be Hatake because he _doesn't_ have a Sharingan!" Ao managed to scream over the slowly growing din.

"He doesn't – " Mei whipped her head around. Her blue eyes were blazing furiously. " _What._ "

"Exactly that. This baby doesn't lie." Ao tapped the side of his head, where his Byakugan lay. "I got a good look at him during the scuffle. All the chakra pathways from his shoulders up as well as both of his arms are off. Gone, shut off, burnt out. No chakra, no Sharingan, and no Master of a Thousand Jutsu bullshit."

There was only one phrase that could properly sum up his thoughts when he had first seen that on the field, and that same phrase came out of Mei's mouth just now.

"What the heck."

"I promise you, this isn't a joke."

Chojuro scratched his chin. "Strange that they'd let him out of the village, then. He's got a huge price on his head. Without the Sharingan, he's nothing."

Ao shrugged. "There was a second Jonin with them. Maybe he whined and complained so much that they figured it couldn't hurt if they just let him out, provided he brought along a babysitter."

"Maybe he has another secret weapon that we don't know about and the Sharingan was only ever just a cover-up for the real deal."

" _Ugggh_ ," Mei's head hit her desk with a solid _thunk_. "All right. Ao. Tell your story from the beginning. Again, if you please."

Ao rolled his eyes. "Fine. So, I was going to capture Hatake like you ordered. I couldn't do it myself, obviously, so I needed some relatively strong fighters as allies. But I couldn't have them traced back to us, either, meaning said ninja had to want to work for free. Perhaps someone with an axe to grind against Konoha, Hatake himself, or his dead father."

"Blah blah blah, so by luck you stumbled upon a bunch of survivors from Otogakure, tricked them into thinking you were their old master come back to life, ordered them to go get you a Sharingan, and somehow coerced them into going after Kakashi Hatake." Mei waved her hand. "Skip to the interesting part, when you started fighting."

"I thought my completely original Killer Intent genjutsu was plenty interesting," Ao muttered. "Right. I used my Byakugan, again, to spy on Hatake's team, and figured out they were going to Wave Country to catch pickpockets. Some silly Genin mission; I don't care. We planned an ambush; Hatake and his team walk right into it – "

"And now those Sound guys are so dead you don't even have corpses to show for it," Mei drawled, unimpressed.

Ao crossed his arms. "It wasn't Hatake, it was the damned kid on his team who I'm pretty sure is the _jinchuuriki_ of the freaking _Nine-Tailed Fox_. One moment he was an average dumb little Genin, and the next, everything within one hundred meters of him was charcoal." He shuddered at the memory. _Thank goodness I was observing from a kilometer away, else I'd be toast just like the others._

Mei sighed. "Alright, alright. As disturbing as it is to know that Konoha trusted that maniac with children, no one knew it was you, right?"

"Right."

"Good. Because if Yagura is Konoha's idea of retribution for one dumb kid, imagine what they might do for three."

There was a long silence as they sat there, thinking.

"You're absolutely _sure_ she didn't have any distant relatives who could _also_ come back to get revenge?" Mei asked.

"The family records in Konoha are pretty much open-source. Rin Nohara was a nobody; her family minor, with no bloodline limits, composed of a few merchants and healers here and there, and they produced maybe one or two shinobi each generation, none of whom ever made it to Jonin. By all means she was completely insignificant."

"And she had no other friends? None?" Mei demanded.

"They had an Uchiha teammate. That was how Hatake got the Sharingan." Chojuro shrugged. "But he's dead – died in the Third war, long before the Uchiha Massacre, in an operation against Iwa that went south."

"Iwa. Never liked those pricks." Mei's frown grew deeper. "Why the heck hasn't anything happened to _them_? Why _us_? We kill _one_ girl and get the full brunt of their revenge with Yagura, while Iwa kills _thousands_ in conflicts and betrayals, and get off scot-free with nothing more than a treaty full of empty sanctions!" She shot the grainy photograph of Rin Nohara a vicious glare and crossed her arms. "She's not even _that_ pretty!"

"Beats me. People do the weirdest things for love."

"The only Sharingan left in existence belong to Itachi and Sasuke Uchiha, both of whom were still children who hadn't yet developed the Sharingan when we first started observing Yagura's madness," Chojuro cut in.

"If you're going to use that as an excuse, Hatake was only thirteen…"

"Hatake was already a Jonin by then," Mei cut in. "He gets no excuses."

"But he's an _active-duty_ jonin," Chojuro muttered. "How the hell would he regularly take missions _and_ infiltrate Mist at the same time? Unless…the Sharingan has the ability to maintain its mental connections, even after eye contact has been released? That goes against everything we know about ocular techniques. Then again, the Sharingan has been around for many generations. It's not a stretch to say that they might have figured out a way to make genjutsu stick around…"

"But we've already established that Kakashi Hatake was not the answer," Ao reminded them. "If it's true that his Sharingan is no longer functional, then it's very likely that the genjutsu on Yagura won't be lifted, even if we killed him. And it's also likely that if we captured him alive, he wouldn't be able to break the illusion for us anyhow."

And yet, the more Ao thought about it, the less sure he was of his earlier conclusion. What if, what _if,_ Hatake was pulling the wool over their eyes after all?

Obviously, something like that would take a hellish amount of chakra to maintain, and it was no secret that one of Sharingan Kakashi's few weaknesses was his pitifully average chakra reserves compared to other ninja on his skill level. That bit of information was common knowledge among everyone who had faced him in battle and survived. If he revealed his Sharingan, you were likely to be toast; on the other hand, if you could drag out the fight for long enough, he might toast himself first.

Unless the reason why his chakra reserves were so low – ridiculously so, actually – compared to other ninja on his skill level, was because he was constantly expending his chakra maintaining _this_ link?

But when you thought about it…Gari of Iwagakure, the Raikage, Zabuza Momochi, even those damn puppeteers from Sunagakure, who were pretty lightweight themselves – none of them had such prominent issues with chakra exhaustion. In fact, he was the only one _of_ his stamina level to achieve such international infamy. One might even say that such achievements were logically impossible for someone of his physical limitation, no matter his intelligence…

"Fuck," Ao said, reaching for a bottle of wine. "I'm turning into a conspiracy theorist."

"What will we do now?" Chojuru asked glumly. "That was our best lead gone."

"Wait for Zabuza and Haku to report back, I suppose," Mei said. "And in the meantime, help that Suigetsu kid find his brother's sword, though considering all the time he spent as a test subject for that Orochimaru creep, I'm not sure if we can trust him yet."

"He doesn't have a functioning curse seal or any physical modifications I can see," Chojuro said. "We should at least give him a chance – "

She shook her head, ignoring him. "What the actual fuck. I honestly thought we had been on to something here."

By now, Ao was well on his way to getting wasted. Just to be safe, however, he took another drink. "The dumbest plan to have ever come out of our village," he ranted. "All this over some stupid _girl_ , whose only important contribution to the world was _dying._ "

* * *

 **A/N: Congrats to Sirwalterbeck, Untrust Us, and randompizza7 for guessing the result of Kirigakure's scheming way back in chapter 36.**

 **Did anyone else guess that? Let me know in the comments!**

 **Also, if you see any mistakes, let me know. This chapter has not been proofread carefully.**


	47. The Calm Before the Storm

_ANBU Research Center 1B_

"Team 7. Isn't seven supposed to be a lucky number?" Jiraiya asked, staring at the opened body bags in the morgue. "Can't believe they brought all these back."

Finding out Naruto had mastered another tail in the span of the three days they had been away without him − _and_ been the first of the team to successfully develop Killer Intent − _as well as_ something to do with a new top secret "to be discussed in absolute confidence later" chakra nature combination that left both Kakashi and Yamato completely nerding out (when they weren't worrying over the kids like a couple of mother hens, that is)…

It was shocking and humbling, to say the least.

Tsunade snorted. "Tell that to the local card dealers." She shook her head. "It's _always_ Team 7. Although, granted, we never got into this much trouble as Genin."

Jiraiya glanced upwards. "It's like the gods have a special vendetta against any kid who sticks out above the norm."

"But maybe it's for the best, isn't it?" Tsunade asked. "I mean, their lives might be exciting in a bad way, but at least they'll make it through. Versus the backend cannon fodder, who quite often die without a chance to defend themselves."

"Maybe, maybe not," Jiraiya replied. "While it's true that the cannon fodder seem to die more often, statistically speaking, a larger percentage of them make it through to old age and live normal, quiet lives. Versus each generation of Team 7, well…let's just say that way less than twenty-five percent of _all_ Konoha nin have either died or defected."

"Where's Anko?" Tsunade asked, changing the topic.

Jiraiya shrugged. "Probably early. Again."

Tsunade looked down at the clipboard and frowned. "Why do a bunch of them have numbers written in the 'name' field?"

"According to the ANBU interrogation teams, those were the names Orochimaru gave them. Call him organized, but personally, I think he was too lazy to get attached to his experiments," Jiraiya said. "Only the exceptional successes got to keep their names."

Tsunade shuddered. "Says here the only two that _had_ names were a…Karin, and a…Jugo, right? Did they say anything about Orochimaru?"

"Interrogators reported that they _believed_ Orochimaru sent them; further examination of their memories only depict a man _looking_ like Orochimaru."

"I take it to mean that wasn't him."

Jiraiya scoffed. "Of course not. Someone else used Orochimaru's image to dupe the poor things into working for him."

"Kumogakure?" Tsunade hazarded a guess. "Or Akatsuki?"

Jiraiya shrugged. "Don't know yet. But maybe there's someone who could help us figure it out." He picked up his books and walked out the door. "Hey, Anko! You have those sealing things ready yet?"

"You mean that funky little wood carving thing that looks like a chopped-up snake?" Anko yelled back. "Yeah, they're all right here."

Jiraiya turned back with a quick wave. "All right, gotta go. See you around, Tsunade."

* * *

 _The Yamanaka Clan Compound_

"Ino, before we get into the training, I want to ask you – are you fine?"

Ino cocked her head at Kakashi-sensei. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, back there, you also had your first kill, but you were so busy worrying over Naruto because he had more to worry about than you." He took a deep breath. "What I'm saying is, you don't have to take on all of the emotional support roles yourself."

She scoffed, wondering how she could switch the topic of this conversation to wheedling blackmail material out of her errant teacher. "Who else on this team will, then, if not me? What do you do, but come home every day to an empty apartment with nothing but your books for company? Unless − " she smirked, "you have a secret girlfriend somewhere."

"If I did, I wouldn't be taking this thing out in public every chance I got," he said, holding up his aforementioned questionable reading material.

"That sounds reasonable…unless it's in reality a cover so you can preserve your secret," Ino grinned evilly. "You can't expect me to believe that you've never had a girlfriend, _ever_. Come on! Spill!"

Kakashi-sensei looked upwards, as if thinking, and then shrugged. "I had plenty of 'girlfriends', but unfortunately none of them lasted very long − "

 _Yesyesyesyes!_ Ino couldn't be happier if she was Naruto winning the lottery for a lifetime's unlimited supply of ramen!

" − mainly because I always ended up either killing them or one of their relatives," he finished.

 _Aaand_ just like that it was all gone. Ino made a disgusted face.

He mock-glared at her. "Look, it's not _my_ fault ANBU-commissioned murders tend to get in the way of healthy relationships. "

Ino didn't even know how to respond to that.

"I'm _serious_ , sensei!" she growled, because this _was_ serious. "Shikamaru and I both have our families, and Naruto has his 'Old Man Hokage' and Jiraiya, but who do _you_ have?"

Kakashi-sensei stopped smiling and talking, and for a moment there Ino thought that he hadn't heard what she had asked him.

"I guess Gai sort of counts," he finally answered. "Don't tell him that, though. In fact, don't repeat it to anyone, or I will hunt you down."

Ino mimed zipping her lips. "Patients' confidentiality." Gai-sensei. Well, that was better than nothing. "Okay, good enough. Anyone else?"

"It doesn't matter. They're all dead."

"…Oh."

"I'm fine."

"Are you really?"

He didn't answer, and chose to ruffle her hair instead. Ino huffed in annoyance – what was she, a fresh Academy graduate? She wasn't _that_ much shorter than him anymore!

It occurred to her that Kakashi-sensei was Kakashi-sensei for a reason. She wondered why he wasn't even _more_ insane than what he already was. Losing all of your teammates…one was already bad enough; she couldn't imagine losing _everyone_ on Team 7.

Self-sacrifice was a funny thing. She could imagine herself doing it…but she couldn't possibly allow any of the others to do the same for her. The same was probably true in the reverse direction. All things came in pairs, the same spoke poking out opposite sides of the wheel of fate. Love could either create life or end it; just her luck that shinobi cried in blood, not tears.

Ino smiled. "All right. Well, I'm always here."

And then it was no longer about the blackmail, or her silly gossip column.

"Their names were Obito and Rin," Kakashi-sensei said suddenly. "Obito was a total loser. He was a member of the Uchiha clan, but only in name. He was about as un-Uchiha as you could get. Loud, clumsy, at the bottom of his class, talkative, annoying, and always making excuses. He'd cry and then claim dust got in his eyes and of course no one believed that terrible lie because he was always wearing these stupid bright orange goggles. But he was also headstrong, and loyal, and cared about his friends like you wouldn't believe, to the point where he died saving the life of a stupid arrogant idiot who never appreciated him until he was already dead.

"Rin was the nicest girl you ever met. She never got mad or raised her voice at anyone, ever. That didn't mean she was a pushover, though. She wasn't afraid to stand up for herself when she saw injustice. She defended anyone that needed her help − even the biggest losers on earth had a place in her heart. She had enough love in her for the entire world and gave it freely to everyone, even to stupid arrogant idiots who didn't love her back. Wicked smart, too. She was a medic in training, and could list and identify all the major muscles and bones and nerves in the body after only one night of reading this old anatomy textbook. She sacrificed herself for the village when she was just around your age.

"And then Minato-sensei, he – " Kakashi-sensei suddenly narrowed his eyes at her. "How did this happen? Weren't we supposed to be talking about _your_ mental health?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Ino said innocently.

Kakashi-sensei glared at her in mock annoyance and shook his head. "You're a little terror is what you are." Then he shrugged, and said, "Well, you know what they say. The fastest way to someone's heart is through the ribcage."

And all of a sudden the world was all right again, in the most horribly wrong way.

Ino dropped her notebook and pencil and spluttered. "What? Sensei! _Ew!_ "

Kakashi-sensei snickered. "I'm only joking!"

Ino rolled her eyes.

"It's really easier from the back than from the front…but then you wouldn't be able to see the look on his face!"

" _Sensei!_ "

* * *

 _Training Ground 10_

"Oi! Naruto! I have a surprise for you!" Jiraiya yelled.

"What?" Naruto yelled back.

Jiraiya reached behind his back and brought out, with a flourish, a giant scroll. "Ta-da~! Starting today, you are going to learn how to summon – where'd you get that?"

"It's a nin-dog!" Naruto said proudly, holding up the little ball of fur. "Nin-puppy," he amended.

Jiraiya gaped. "Where the blazes did you get a nin-dog from?"

Naruto held up Kakashi-sensei's family scroll. "I _summoned_ them. _Duh!_ "

"But – _why_?"

Naruto smirked. "Because dogs are better than toads!"

Jiraiya's face turned red. "You take that back right now, you little blasphemer!"

"Nuh-uh!" Naruto turned around and covered his ears, loudly singing, "Dogs are bet-ter than to~ads! Dogs are _bet_ -ter than to~ads!"

"Dammit, Kakashi," Jiraiya muttered. "Ungrateful brat! After all I've done for you! I never got this cheek from, who was it? Oh, that's right, _Sasuke-teme!_ He never disrespected his elders!"

"Hah! Can't disrespect something with no respect in the first place! Ino says you don't teach him anything but how to pick up hookers anyway!" Naruto stuck out his tongue and crossed his arms. "Why are you so hung up on those dumb toads, anyway?"

A sad look passed over Jiraiya's eyes, but a second later it was replaced by the bravado Naruto was so used to. "Because toads are the best animals ever, brat! Not like you'd understand, filthy dog-lover."

"Hey! Dogs are man's best friend, not toads! And I wasn't talking about _you_ , I was talking about you trying to get _me_ to sign a contract with those toads. They honestly _don't_ make sense for me; I have my shadow clones, so wouldn't a pack animal where I can summon a lot of at one time fit me better?" Naruto pointed out. "Teach me a cool ninjutsu or something. Like your spiky hair technique! I always wanted to learn that one!"

Jiraiya slumped, defeated. "Later, okay?"

Naruto took this opportunity to take a peek at the toad contract. Unlike the dog summons, which was signed by all Hatake clan members s until he came along, the toad scroll was more diverse. There was someone with the family name Eruka, and then an Arashi with more illegible calligraphy, a bunch of smudged inkblots, and then Jiraiya, and finally, the most recent one, a Minato Nami-something.

"Who's that guy?" Naruto asked, pointing. "Was he your student?" A memory suddenly came back to the front of his brain, from way back before the Chunin exams, when they were still annoying the Old Man Hokage with impromptu vacations to Uzushiogakure. _Jiraiya, one of the three Sannin,_ Naruto remembered Kakashi-sensei telling them, during his lessons on the ancient and modern sealing masters. That trip to Uzushiogakure seemed so long ago. Maybe one day Naruto would come back. _He taught the Yondaime. The Yondaime's wife was also a sealing master. They both died during the night of the Kyuubi attack._

Jiraiya snapped out of his stupor and grabbed at the scroll, trying to cover up the names with his hands, but it was too late. "None of your business!"

"…Okay," Naruto shrugged, and handed the scroll back to Jiraiya, though not before shooting the Hokage Monument a glance. _The Fourth Hokage had a name,_ Naruto thought. _Once upon a time, he was more than a stone face on a mountain and a mere echo in history. He was a real person._ Naruto felt bad, that a guy like him would be forgotten by their generation, even if he _had_ ruined Naruto's life.

 _Minato, huh?_

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

"Shit!" I swore, dropping my brush. The piece of paper I had been writing on crinkled and collapsed onto itself with a pained little noise, and the ink on it coalesced into an unreadable lump of black soon after.

My previous rose-colored view of sealing was gone. I now hated it with a passion.

Okay, fine. I didn't _hate it_ hate it.

But I hated it.

I had known sealing was going to be difficult. I hadn't known it would be _this_ difficult. Turns out copying instructions on how to draw a seal versus designing one yourself were two entirely different monsters.

Fuinjutsu. The F word of the shinobi world, and for good reason. As Orochimaru and Kakashi-sensei had learned firsthand, seals were as temperamental as chemical fires in water. The basic forms were easy enough to learn, provided one had neat enough handwriting, but putting them together was a different story. They changed in purpose according to every situation, but there were few resources describing how.

From what I read, it was a bit like developing conventional jutsu, only much less exact. Hand seals focused chakra within the body, and seals focused chakra outside the body. But that minor difference was what made them so hard to use. The entire world was filled with energy, which translated to random disturbances. On one hand, internally molded chakra was always relatively safe, as it was confined to the innate physical structure of the human body. On the other hand, seals could be drawn to channel chakra in such a way that our much more simplistic chakra pathways would never be capable of. It was why you could get such a large array of custom security locks from one simple base design.

But that seemed to be the limit of their use, simply because they took so much time and training to prepare. The other shinobi arts – ninjutsu, genjutsu, taijutsu – they took less time to yield greater results. Why spend weeks learning the basics behind the creation of an exploding tag, when you could learn an even more powerful fire jutsu and be done with it?

Patience was a useful attribute, but war forced speed-learning out of everybody. It was lucky, then, that war was not upon us just yet. Suna was a close call, but it hadn't escalated any further, and that was what counted.

Grumbling to myself, I grabbed a pair of tweezers I had wisely thought to take with me, and slowly began to peel the tiny square apart so I could take a closer look at what went wrong. The task was as painful for my fingers as unfolding an extremely complicated work of origami, with none of the aesthetic beauty to go along with it.

"Wow," I heard someone say from behind me. "Those paintings…are really ugly."

I froze, and turned around slowly. "…Oh, _hey_ , Kakashi-sensei!" I greeted him awkwardly, trying to shove the results of my failures under a nearby rock in the least obvious way possible. I _hated_ it when he snuck up on me like that. "Good to _see_ you!"

His eye crinkled, and he nudged the rock out of my reach with his foot. "Having fun?"

"Oh, shut up," I grunted. "Between the two of us, you're the one with the atrocious handwriting."

"And yet said atrocious handwriting still results in seals more stable than yours."

 _Ouch. Way to rub salt in a wound._ Even with his mask on I could see the shit-eating grin on his face. "Please, they haven't blown up yet."

"Of course they're not going to blow up. The scale of chakra these exercises require is way too small. And of course your math is correct; you couldn't blow them up if you tried."

" _Obviously_ ," I sighed, "my problem is the exact _opposite_." I carefully picked up my pile of ruined experiments, smoothed them out, and began to rearrange them to the best of my ability into organized stacks. A harder task than it sounded, since I had been unable to unfold many of them all the way, and could only guess at what it looked like before. "Why do they do this?" I asked, holding up my most recent failure.

Kakashi-sensei opened his mouth.

"And I need a more specific reason than 'interaction with energy already present in the environment' because I made sure I already accounted for that. I'm putting too little energy in them, so they collapse from outside pressure, but _why_?"

Kakashi-sensei closed his mouth.

"No, really," I pressed. "Help me."

He raised an eyebrow and leaned over to take a closer look at my work. Then, he smirked.

 _Great. That means I'll be feeling exceptionally stupid later._

"Here's a hint," he said. "Are you absolutely _sure_ you've accounted for _all_ the energy already present in the environment?"

 _What are you talking about?_ I grumbled to myself.

Kakashi-sensei shrugged, still smirking. In one fluid motion, he calmly strolled across the grass, treading softly over my ruined seals. With every step they unfolded themselves as easily as a butterfly unfolded its wings, and I was left with even more exasperation and even less understanding than before.

* * *

 _ANBU Containment Complex 802F_

"So you think Gaara's ready to reintegrate?" Ibiki asked.

"You mean is it safe?" Inoichi asked, and Ibiki nodded. "Yes, it's safe. His behavior is consistent. To be honest, we haven't needed to keep him behind that wall of seals for a long time. It was just done for security purposes. But of course you already know that."

Ibiki's eyes quickly scanned the papers Inoichi tossed at him. They seemed well enough in order, though one could never be too sure in these situations.

 _ **Progress Report [18-10-18 of Series G]**_

 _ **Name:**_ _Gaara_

 _F |_ _ **M**_

 _ **Age:**_ _13_

 _ **DOB:**_ _19 Jan._

 _ **Height:**_ _148.1 cm_

 _ **Weight:**_ _40.2 kg_

 _ **Blood Type:**_ _AB_

 _ **Additional Classification:**_ _Jinchuuriki, possible Sensor type_

 _ **Notes:**_

 _Behavior is socially acceptable towards those he is familiar with (mainly myself, Ibiki Morino, and ANBU operatives [redacted], [redacted], [redacted], [redacted]. He only recognizes the aforementioned operatives by their masks and voices._

 _Is no longer hostile towards strangers. No longer believes murder is an acceptable form of self-validation. May still be considered extremely shy or antisocial by normal standards. He hopes that Konoha will be different from Suna. I hope so too, because_ _we will be in big trouble if it's not. T_ _he poor kid's been through enough already. Suggestion to introduce him to Naruto Uzumaki. Suggestion for a vague physical disguise so no one remembers him from the Chunin exams, such as dyed hair, fake eyebrows, and the removal of his tattoo._

 _Above average to high above average skill in analytical reasoning, pattern recognition, and stealth. Extremely high endurance, as typical of a jinchuuriki. Very patient (I know this sounds strange given his past behavior, but he is at his core a very calm and collected individual)._

 _May need retraining in proper taijutsu, which he has neglected after being dependent on his sand jutsu his whole life._

 _Current recommendation for best course of action: let him remain under ANBU care, as it is too late in the cycle to put him in the traditional three man cell with native Konoha nin. Due to his high skill level he might work best directly interacting with fully advanced nin._

Ibiki nodded and gave Inoichi an affectionate pat on the shoulder. "Well, all I have to say is that I'm really impressed. Just a Chunin Exam ago, this kid was trying to murder everything that moved. He's definitely not the same crazy kid we started with, for sure."

"For sure."

There was some silence, save for a soft rustle of shuffling papers. Ibiki coughed. "So."

"So…what?"

"So are we going to give him the Konoha headband? Or what?"

Inoichi frowned. "You know, I'm not quite sure."

"Really? I'd have expected you to want to make him feel part of the team, or some psychological trite like that."

"Normally, I would. But he's a special case. He's not just _any_ defected ninja – "

"Defected, as in we gave him a little 'convincing', but sure – "

"I _mean_ , he is a _very_ high-profile character! He is the _son_ of the previous Kazekage, and he's a jinchuuriki whom Suna still regards as rightfully _theirs_! Putting a Konoha hitai-ate on him? We might as well dress him up in a traffic-cone-orange jumpsuit and plant a big red 'X' on his back for good measure." Inoichi rubbed his temples. "Ideally, we'd put him in a more secretive group."

"Like ANBU, you mean," Ibiki deduced.

"Exactly. It's a tight-knit group without the publicitty."

Ibiki shifted. "Hm."

"What?"

"Oh, nothing. Just thinking. You spent so much time working on him. His social skills are still on the barely acceptable end. You think ANBU will help?"

Inoichi shrugged. "He could go into one of the passive divisions. Like interrogation or research. Unlike the assassins or the hunter-nin, they do reveal their faces and converse with one another on a regular basis. Besides, even though he's very combat-oriented, it might be a better idea to not send him out on field missions. You know what sorts of intel have been coming into intelligence headquarters regarding foreign jinchuuriki…"

Ibiki frowned. "All they said was that a few rogue jinchuuriki had disappeared off the map. They could be hiding, for all we know. I wouldn't blame them for wanting a break from 'civilization', given how said 'civilization' has treated them."

"That could be. But, you know how things are for us. Nothing is ever that simple." Inoichi put down the last of his files and walked out the door.

Ibiki scowled. "Don't remind me."

* * *

 _ANBU Research Center 1A_

Anko poked the seal – a serpentine coil of kanji wrapped tightly in knotlike loops around a ring of petrified wood carved in the shape of a figure eight. It was a strange-looking thing, but then again, Orochimaru was a strange-looking person. In her opinion, this twisted up hunk of crystallized minerals was an improvement.

She wanted to break it in half and send it through a meat grinder.

Sadly, she wasn't allowed to.

 _Stupid bureaucrats._

"You think that's all of him?" she asked.

"All of him that's left," Kakashi answered. "I searched every single link. Most of them were dead ends, literally. Turns out poisonous bijuu chakra can kill a curse seal just as well as starving it of chakra can, minus the part where the host also dies. Where did you get the idea to use remote linking, anyway?"

"Sorry, what?"

"Jiraiya told me that idea came from you."

"Oh, that." _Shoot, what was the excuse Shikamaru gave me again?_ "Look, it wasn't even me. Long story, dumb explanation − I heard from that girl from the ANBU Cipher Corps that if we _all_ communicate on the same radio network, and the enemy manages to get one device, then they could easily listen to _all_ of our conversations. That's why we break up everything into lots of frequencies and mix them up, with secret codes thrown in for good measure. And so I told Jiraiya, 'if only it was that easy for Orochimaru, finding all the other curse seals by hacking one of them.' I didn't realize it was possible until you guys said it was."

"Ah."

How they did it, Anko didn't care. The only thing that mattered was that Orochimaru was here in front of her _right now_. What's more, he was _completely defenseless_.

"So he's sealed in this thing now?" Anko asked.

"Yes."

She tossed it in the air a few times and kicked it around. "What are we doing with it, then?"

Kakashi shrugged. "They'll destroy it soon. Probably with poisonous bijuu chakra."

"But for now _we_ have it."

"Well, first we're supposed to question him, and then the Sandaime wants to have a look at it, too. I mean, the guys that attacked my team in Wave were after me specifically, under the orders of some guy pretending to be him." Kakashi shrugged. "It's unlikely that Orochimaru will be able to tell us why, but at least he'll be able to confirm that it wasn't him."

"Question this…thing?" Anko shot the hunk of wood a dubious glance.

"Well, his thoughts are all encoded into this seal, so whatever he's thinking, we'll be able to read. All we have to do is write into this blank square over here," Kakashi explained, pointing.

"Can't imagine he's having a fun time," Anko said, not without a substantial amount of glee. "I mean, he split himself up into so many pieces, and now most of them are dead. I imagine, even if he _did_ manage to make it back into a body, he'd be as charred as – you know, that night."

"I imagine so," Kakashi said shortly.

"Well, what are we waiting for?" Anko asked, grabbing a blowtorch and a pair of senbon. "Let's get this party started! Where are his pain receptors encoded, again?"

"You won't need those," Kakashi told her. "Like I said, all of his thoughts are encoded with the seals on the surface of this stone-wood block. It's like any normal person trying to lie or withhold information from a Yamanaka when you're limbless, bound, and drained of chakra, while they've already successfully infiltrated your mind."

Anko snorted, and pressed the tip of her red-hot senbon into the surface of the seal, watching the writing in her former teacher's brain twist and writhe. "Who said anything about questioning?"

Kakashi blinked a few times, staring as she cheerfully stabbed little smiley faces and hearts in random places. Then, he grabbed a scalpel, charged it with some electricity, and joined her.

* * *

BONUS #39

 _Life Lessons from Jiraiya_

[www] fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/162208940/1/Bonus-39-Life-Lessons-from-Jiraiya

* * *

 **A/N: What's your best/worst lame pickup line?**

 ***Edit, since I've been getting a lot of comments about Naruto. Sealing will be in his future, but at present he does not have the academic background to get started on the math-y stuff. Regarding "dogs are better than toads" - this is a Noodle Incident from Kakashi's Enfant Terrible days, and meant for humor. The toad _summons_ on average are stronger than dogs; however, Naruto being Naruto...let's just say his dogs will be different from Pakkun & co. **


	48. Of Monsters and Men

**A/N: Thank you for your patience these past few weeks. Final exams are officially over for me, though! Hopefully I'll have more time to work on this over the summer. My update buffer is pretty much exhausted.**

* * *

 _ANBU Containment Complex K131_

"I'm sorry. I should have known by now to not leave Anko and Kakashi unsupervised together," Hiruzen spoke to the petrified wood block that now held his most and least favorite student.

The writing on Orochimaru's last body, if you could even call it that, shifted. _She was always a good learner. Too good._

"Ah. Well, she _was_ your student."

 _Regrettable. I should have wished for a dumber one._

Hiruzen paused, not knowing what else to say.

He finally settled on, "You never did tell me why."

The paper vibrated hollowly, echoes of Orochimaru's own mirthless chuckle. _And you never even noticed when._

"Humor an old man, will you?" Hiruzen sighed. "When?"

If Orochimaru had a mouth, he would be grinning humorlessly. _I've always been scared of death, sensei. Ever since my parents died in front of my face and I could do nothing to stop it. You know that story._

"But you were never willing to start researching kinjutsu before. What finally convinced you that the price to pay for immortality was worth it? I taught you better than that." Hiruzen tried to make himself sound disappointed in his former student, as a good teacher should. He really did.

But within him, he knew he had no right to ask Orochimaru such things. He had no right to ask anyone such things. Orochimaru had made that explicitly clear when he had abandoned the village, so many years ago.

They both knew why he had to leave. Of course they did.

 _You also taught me about the Will of Fire, and nobility, and honor, and so many other little white lies. Fat load of good it did Sakumo Hatake in the end._

"Is that when? Sakumo?"

 _It doesn't matter. Konoha is a flightier bitch than Jiraiya's whores. She elevates her men to fame and glory and then smashes them down to earth as it suits her. Never caring for them any further than what benefit they can bring her, and never sparing a thought to what she might give to them for their sacrifices in return. They lay down their lives and honor for her, and what does she do but leave them to their fates and abandon them to die? So I thought, if I was going to live in such a world of villains, I might as well be truthful about the sort of man I am._

"Orochimaru."

 _Play the grandfather all you like, sensei. We both know the real reason why you are so lenient with my abandonment, why wasted so much time before sending men out after me. It had nothing to do with our student-teacher bond, the old love you felt for your adopted son –_

"Are you denying that it never existed – "

 _No, but I am denying that excuse for why you didn't come after me. Student or not, you knew what the good of the village meant. You knew the value of discipline. You would have brought me back and thrown me in jail, if it hadn't been for one thing._

"Oh?"

 _Don't deny it, you liar. You look just like me underneath that skin. I don't blame you for it. I just wish you wouldn't pretend otherwise. Every shinobi in this village, in the Five Nations and all the satellite states in between, is like this. I'm the one who peeled off that skin and finally admitted to the world what I am. I understand why you won't want them to see that. You're a village leader; you've got to keep the peace._

"And you just want to let chaos run?"

 _I'm a scientist; I'm free to be open-minded. I don't blame you for wanting to live the way you want. I just wish you wouldn't blame me for wanting to live the way I want._

Hiruzen rolled his eyes. "I'd say that you're hurting innocent people, but then you'd just reply that I do the same, in even greater numbers."

 _And you've got a robe and hat to protect you._

"That, too."

If Orochimaru was here in full form he'd be looking down at the ground and tapping his fingers on his knees. That was one habit he had never broken when he was younger. _You know,_ the writing said, _it's funny how our world works. When a man kills one man, he's a murderer. Kill a hundred men, and he's a war hero. Ten thousand, and he's a king; a million, and he's a god._

"You've always been too smart for your own good, Orochimaru."

 _What can I say. I'm ahead of the curve._

"You were with the Akatsuki for a while, weren't you? How is Itachi?"

 _Aren't you communicating with him regularly? Part of your little plan, isn't he?_

"Only the bare necessities. I am completely blind when it comes to his health; he tells me nothing. I think it is because he is blind to his own health, as well. I care about him, Orochimaru. Tell me, how was he when you saw him last. Please?" Hiruzen begged.

There was a lull, as if pausing to snort in disgust. _He has a lung problem. Terminal. It wasn't so bad when I last saw him, but that was years ago. It should be worse by now. But you already know that. The Uchiha already knew that, when he was born. It was why they pushed him into this life so quickly in the first place. Wanted to wring out all the use out of their little genius they could before he died, I bet._

"I take it he's dying more quickly than anticipated."

 _He doesn't let it bother him much. He really loves this place, you know. And he loves that brother of his._ Another pause, for a wry laugh. _I don't understand why I'm so scared of death myself, sometimes. Why I want to continue living in a putrid world like this. It's what separates the other smart ones from me, I guess. I know for a fact Kakashi-kun is more ready for death than any other man._

"Are you ready for death, Orochimaru?"

 _Nope. Never. Why do you think I look like this?_

"But you _were_ dead. For a time."

 _Not quite. The seals. They kept me alive. Barely conscious. Less than a ghost, but more than gone. Not the nicest way to live…_ the block seemed to shrug, _…but I was alive. Good enough, I guess. My life has been an entire compilation of 'good enough' and yet not._

"You'll be destroyed soon; you know that, right? We can't let you live."

 _I know. I keep telling myself I'm ready to die, but I'm not._

 _I don't want to die, sensei._

Hiruzen wanted to give Orochimaru one more chance. But the Sandaime was done with second chances. "The matter of your life or death has been out of my control for a long time now, Orochimaru. Much like you were."

 _I hate this village, sensei. I hate the shinobi. I hate what our world lives and stands for, what they gear children to be. But I can never leave it behind. For all of her faults, Konoha does have the sneakiest way of worming herself into our hearts._

"You speak of her like she's the worst girlfriend in the world."

 _Now wouldn't Jiraiya just love that?_

Hiruzen Sarutobi sighed, feeling so much older than he already was. "I'm sorry, Orochimaru. I failed you. I have always failed you."

 _No you didn't. No one fails anyone. How can there be blame, when good or evil doesn't exist? Your morality is a stupid and nonexistent construct!_

"I'd say that causing others suffering is not a nonexistent construct."

 _You eat meat. By definition, survival of one creature is the suffering of another._

"Unnecessary suffering, then."

 _You mean those experiments of mine? But that was for my own survival, too._

"You could have lived naturally without them."

 _And you could have lived naturally without being a shinobi, or a Hokage._

"Call me a hypocrite all you like. We are both flawed men. But at the end of the day, at least I've improved more lives than I've caused suffering. Your experiments, on the other hand, have helped no one but yourself."

 _We could argue about this all day and never get anywhere. You're blind, afraid to pry into things you call too 'dangerous' for human minds to comprehend. Truth is a release from fear. Fear of not being loved, of betrayal, of mercy and expectations and judgments of your fellow man. Even release from fear of death, which is admittedly the one truth I never managed to accept. But everyone is so afraid of what will happen once all that love and mercy disappears that they don't realize that betrayal and hate disappear with it too._

"And I suppose I would find you quite deep, if I was fourteen years old," the Sandaime responded coldly. "Good-bye, Orochimaru. May you find peace, wherever you go next."

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

You can be sure that my life after that revolved around that packet of notes and the great brick wall of confusion that came with it. It had been a very disconcerting experience for me, to say the least. For a moment, I felt completely helpless and worthless for being just so _lost_.Having been so used to solving any sort of problem easily my entire life, it was difficult for me to accept that something like this – a mere sheet of paper with scratches of ink and graphite – would take up so much of my time.

It carried on like this for…I don't know how long. During the day, I'd sit there and idly redraw my seals over and over again, watching as I made zero progress while Ino zoomed through her katas and Naruto's summons grew to the size of wolves. And at night, I'd stay up until dawn, rederiving the basic geometry behind the character arrangements, all to no avail. Time and time again, I would turn back to my monstrous package of notes for a hint, any hint at all.

My favorite thing to read in that set, oddly enough, was the Yondaime's diary, the one that detailed the process of the creation of his famed Hiraishin no Jutsu. Yes, the single _one_ technique that apparently was considered powerful enough to make up for the loss of a Sharingan. One technique! No wonder Kakashi-sensei and Jiraiya treated it like a gift from the gods.

Currently, all of this was way beyond my level. But it made me feel better, at least, that I wasn't getting it right away.

 _Minato's Log of Awesome Awesomeness! #493_

The massive number at the end made the corner of my mouth twitch. Well, no one could accuse the Yondaime Hokage of lacking determination.

 _Sealing is something that is part technique and part intuition. The technique part of it is so strange and complicated, it might as well be intuition, and the intuition part of it is so simple and straightforward it might as well be a technique all in its own. It's like trying to explain colors to someone who was born blind._

 _Imagine, I suppose, learning how to read. Or – not even that. Because when one learns how to read, one already knows the language beforehand. So – imagine learning to speak your mother tongue. It is not something you remember doing. Certainly, it is not something you remember not knowing; it is difficult to imagine what your own language might sound like to a foreigner._

 _Now imagine creating one of those things. Languages are human constructs, several millenia in the making. Complexity – conjugation – writing, listening, reading, speaking – they were all things that were the work of entire societies over the span of many generations. To be expected to create a language of my own…admittedly, sealing was a much simpler thing than a whole spoken and written creation, but the hard part wasn't just creating a system of sealing. It was creating something that I personally could use and understand like second nature, as easily as a mother tongue._

 _Now how are you supposed to create your own mother tongue for something that is already difficult to understand enough as it is?_

 _I was like a child learning how to write his numbers. He might know what the shape of an 8 looks like, but until one teaches him the concept of counting and values, he wouldn't at all understand what the figure 8 stands for._

 _Such a problem, of figuring how to bridge that gap between my processing and understanding, completely consumed me…_

I smiled to myself. Finally, someone who understood me.

Too bad he was dead.

I never even knew him, but it made me really sad for some reason. I traced his handwriting with my fingers. So much knowledge was contained in these pages, so much more potential knowledge he could have contributed to the world. All of it, gone. Just like the ruined libraries of Uzushiogakure. So many things that could have been known but now never would be.

… _Sure, I could have memorized and regurgitated everything, but that sort of brute force learning wasn't something I appreciated. It wasn't enough for me to know that something worked like it was supposed to; I had to know why. Basic forms were only good for doing the basic things, exactly as they had been designed. There was no way for me to put them together into something more advanced, as sealing was supposed to afford me._

 _In the end, however, it was this mode of thinking that paid off, because that question of why was exactly the right approach to the task of developing one's on sealing language. One had to understand the exact reasons behind each energy transfer, the exact rationale leading up to every brush stroke, even in the basic schematics. Especially in the basic schematics._

 _I couldn't build a house without learning about each individual component. It wasn't enough just accepting anyone's random pre-made bricks and throwing them on top of each other – a good architect needed to account for what type of bricks he'd use and why. Some minimized cost; some maximized durability; some shouldn't be used at all, and instead be swapped out for wood, concrete, or other material. There were just so many different things to account for in learning the art, and every single one of them a foreign concept._

While this was somewhat of a morale boost to me, none of it was helpful in directly solving my current problem.

I have little to say about myself during that time, but to those surrounding me, they could easily say I had become an obsessive lunatic, in the nicest terms. My life was a zombie-like state of eating, sleeping, and sealing. To the point where Kakashi-sensei and Ino ended up striking a deal with my mother, that if she caught me staying up late, she should come tell him to take away the portfolio again until I was more responsible with my health.

(My response to that threat had been to nod, agree, and then secretly make backup copies of everything I had done up until that point, in case they really did carry through on that promise.)

Because I was going to _war_ with this stupid fuinjutsu project and I wasn't going to give up until I had conquered it. Some nights, I wouldn't sleep at all, and that was when my mother – my _mother_ , not my father – had to walk into my bedroom, forcibly turn off my desk lamp, and drag me over to my bed. I protested this greatly, but I was in no position to argue.

You know those moments when all it takes is a good night's sleep for everything to make sense, and everything just _clicks_ ,and you then feel really stupid for not figuring it out before? That was my brain, but instead of waking me up in the morning like normal people, it decided to wake me up at 2:00 A.M.

 _How stupid do you have to be,_ I thought in exasperation, _to forget to include your_ own _chakra as part of the seal's environment?_

* * *

 _ANBU Containment Complex East 67-4_

Today was a good day for Inoichi. Gaara had been the one to initiate conversation, instead of letting him speak first as usual. That brought the total up to seven times.

It was not perfect. It was awkward, and it was clumsy, and it was painful, but still – it was a "Hello," and one that hadn't been coaxed and dragged out of him, at that. Considering what he used to be like, Inoichi was ready to write off anything and everything as progress.

"Hello to you, too, Gaara," he replied, making sure to smile. _Always, always, remember to smile._ As part of the act, they had to convince Gaara that they liked him and wanted him to be there, all day every day. Even on the days where Inoichi was so exhausted, all he wanted to do was go home and curl up on the couch next to his daughter with a big tub of ice cream on his lap and the trashiest celebrity magazines in front of his face.

It was a statement of his great acting skills, in his not-very-humble opinion, that Gaara had fallen for his lies – normally, the kid went absolutely nuts at everyone who twitched even a little bit in his presence. After all, he had already fallen for his uncle's mind games once.

Luckily, Inoichi no longer had to spend so much energy pretending to feel something he was not. That was already an enormous load off his chest, and, in turn, made it even easier for him to befriend his young charge. In a classic case of "fake it until you make it," after a few months of Gaara's company, Inoichi found that he genuinely enjoyed talking to the kid. At his core, he was quiet and well-behaved.

Gaara nervously picked at his nails, as if he was having trouble remembering the proper courtesy questions that came after a standard greeting (he probably was), and asked, "How are you doing today, Inoichi?"

"I'm doing very well, Gaara. Thank you for asking. I hope you're feeling happy, too?" It was a strange question to ask a political prisoner, but compared to how the prisoners of war from the past Shinobi wars were still languishing, hidden and forgotten, in the dark corners of the other ANBU cells, Gaara was being treated like a king.

"Yes, I am happy here." Gaara attempted a smile. It was not a completely visually appealing smile, but it would do for his purposes. Better than the psychotic things he used to give every time he was about to go on a rampage; this one, at least, could be displayed to civilians without scaring anyone off or oherwise causing small children to burst into tears. Such was the result of having to use muscles one had never used before.

Besides, it was rather endearing. It reminded him of those little dogs who were so ugly that they were cute. What were they called – Hatake had one of them – right, pugs. Not that Gaara by himself was ugly, but he could make the strangest facial expressions sometimes. Perhaps it was a result of his emotionally challenged upbringing, or perhaps it was simply because he had reached the awkward stage of his life – what his wife liked to call "waiting for the puberty train" − while in captivity.

"How would you feel about leaving?"

Gaara blinked. "…Leave – leaving?"

"If you feel you are ready, we'd like to start reintroducing you to the rest of the world. You know, getting to go outside, talking to others, that sort of thing."

"Oh. I don't know." Suddenly, he looked frightened. "You're not sending me back, are you?"

Inoichi shook his head furiously. "Of course not! You'll get to stay in Konoha with me. Unless you want to go back to Suna?"

"No! I want to stay here. With you!"

"You can go wherever you want, Gaara. If you want to stay here, then you can stay, and we won't make you leave," Inoichi said soothingly. Of course, this was a complete lie. The plan was, if Gaara wanted to go home to Suna, they would "agree" and promise to let him out when he was ready, and then stall for time until he considered Konoha to be his home.

"Promise?"

"Promise what? That we won't make you leave?"

"Yes."

"I promise."

"Now, we're not going to shove you back into the big city right away. I plan to introduce you to small groups of people at a time. That way, you can grow close to them without having to worry about everybody else," Inoichi explained.

"But what if they don't like me?"

The question was plaintive. Insecure. Slightly worried. This was the child Gaara should have been, the child Gaara might still be able to be.

"They'll like you; don't worry. You're a good kid, Gaara. From the time I've spent getting to know you, I say I like you very much," Inoichi reassured him. Now that he was sleeping more peacefully at night, he no longer had that dead look in his eyes, which made him significantly more approachable.

 _If you could get over the fact that he had witnessed and caused the deaths of hundreds of people before this point._ Which Inoichi could, because he had never personally known any of those people. If Gaara had caused harm to say, Ino, he might not have been so forgiving.

"Yeah, but you're, _you_ ," Gaara mumbled.

It was flattering, that Gaara would single out him as that one special human being out of all the other people he had met in his life, to say the least, but it was not part of the plan to have Gaara to grow unconditionally attached to just him. Friendship and loyalty was good, but he needed to be able to deal with other people, too, otherwise he'd never be able to survive in the general squad organization that Konoha operated around.

But it was alright. Gaara was still learning. In a sense he was a lot like many other abuse victims. They needed the time to adjust – first to one trusted individual, and then to small groups, before they could learn to be comfortable among larger crowds of strangers. He was progressing just as well as Inoichi expected him to.

"Okay, fine. I won't promise that _everyone_ will like you, because there's always that one grouchy old guy that hates _everybody_. But in _general_ , I can tell you that people will treat you normally. They won't run away from you for no reason. Not like they did in Suna." Because they wouldn't know Gaara was a jinchuuriki; that was the plan. "The other members of the team like you, too. Remember Ibiki?"

"The man with the funny head?"

Inoichi suppressed a snort. "Yes, him. He likes you, too. And that says a lot of positive things about you, because Ibiki doesn't like a lot of people." That, technically speaking, wasn't true; Ibiki did "like" a lot of people. Or, at least, he claimed that he did. Usually when Ibiki claimed he "liked" someone, it meant bad things for that someone, so Inoichi always took Ibiki's preference in friends with a bag of salt.

For example, he had "liked" that poor Kabuto Yakushi kid (Inoichi wondered if Danzo had ever kept tabs on him). He had also "liked" those teenagers from the Sound who had been unfortunate enough to become Genin under Orochimaru of all people. Ibiki also "liked" Inoichi, and if Inoichi's clan training hadn't prepared him to keep up with the man's maddening psychological tricks, he surely would have been dead right now.

Gaara nodded. "Oh. Okay."

"Right, then. You ready?" Inoichi asked, peeling back the seals that held Gaara at bay.

And then – another first for today – Gaara leaned over and hugged Inoichi.


	49. All Myths Were Once Human

_The Yamanaka Clan Compound_

At first it had been easy.

"It is possible to manipulate elemental chakra without hand seals. The results are quite crude, but in close combat, when you have no time to form hand seals, it's a massive advantage and therefore a necessity for you to learn," Kakashi-sensei began.

"Okay." After a little bit of concentration, Ino managed to send a few sparks out of her fingers, and then her toes, and even her hair for fun. "Now what?"

"Now maintain them," he ordered, demonstrating with his toes.

It took considerably more effort to suspend a needle-shaped electric charge in the air than simply producing one, but she managed to figure it out after a few hours.

"Now use it to defend yourself while I repeatedly try to stab you in the spine with the same thing I just showed you."

"Wait, _WHAT_ – "

 _WHACK._

 _FLIP._

 _THUMP._

And Ino was staring up at the sky with the wind knocked out of her.

Kakashi-sensei's eye crinkled. "No point in learning lightning chakra if you can't even move fast enough to keep up with your own technique, right?"

She quickly jumped back to her feet before she could get ther face beaten in again, knowing better than to complain. _If falling down hurts, I'll make sure whining about it hurts even more_ was his philosophy. Despite his false cheer, he was always very no-nonsense when it came to training. But at least before, he still tried to pretend that it was all just a very silly and terrible joke. There was none of that now; there was little point in him bothering to disguise hour after hour of katas and sparring as a stupid game.

 _Block – jab – kick – lightning hand, get out of the way – yes! I dodged that one!_

 _THWACK._

His arms and legs were longer than hers, giving him a much better reach. Being smaller and more flexible meant that she could theoretically get inside his circle of defense and end him, but reality was a much different matter. Kakashi-sensei, after all, was freakishly fast even for a Jonin. Meanwhile, her main advantage of superior chakra control was negated by the fact that raw electricity didn't care how well it was controlled.

Lightning chakra was easily the most annoying of all the elements. Unlike fire, which burnt you regardless of how large the flame was, lightning chakra had a much steeper power to damage curve. Very powerful electricity was an instant death sentence. Mid-range voltages could cause various degrees of paralysis and shock.

And the non-deadly level, which they had to use for these graining purposes – didn't do anything except sting your nerves in that annoying mid-level that wasn't painful enough to complain about but definitely annoying enough to pay attention to. And the strange tingle in her muscles would last for hours afterwards. Not continuously, either. It would disappear for a short while, and then when she let her guard down, it would come BACK. And so she could never let her guard down for even the smallest second. Her entire body was jittery. She felt like a drug addict, except she wasn't craving to stab any psychoactive substances into herself.

Stabbing psychotic _individuals_ , on the other hand…

Kakashi-sensei wasn't _only_ training her elemental ninjutsu, Ino realized. He was turning her into the same paranoid nut he was. _That son of a…_

And meanwhile, Naruto got to spend his days endlessly summoning puppies, which was _so not fair!_ All right, so he was also doing a lot of ninjutsu training with Jiraiya, but still! Just a week ago his summons were little pink lumps without opened eyes, and now they were running in coordinated formations. He already had, like, fifteen of them. Kakashi-sensei only managed to get up to eight after years of training and chakra development.

They attacked him in a literal dogpile and Naruto went to the ground, laughing.

Internally, she smiled. She was glad to see him return back to his bubbly self. He always tagged along to her extra training sessions, under the pretense that he wanted to be around in case he had any questions to ask about summoning, but she knew that was a lie. Summoning was hard to master but easy to practice. You literally just kept drawing your blood across the contract until your connection with the summons' dimension was strong enough to start drawing out the bigger guys. Nothing complicated about that.

The truth was, Naruto simply didn't want to be left alone. And who would? That boy had been through so much. If he wanted a goddamned hug, she'd give him a goddamned hug, no questions asked. If he decided he wanted to bum over at her place for the rest of eternity, she'd have a room and everything ready for him. (She'd always wanted a little brother anyway – and hey! Naruto was like, the only other blonde in Konoha, so it could easily work, if she wanted to fool tourists and stuff.)

 _THWAP._

"Pay attention."

"I tried, but it didn't PAY ME BACK, you FREELOADING CHEAPSKATE!" she screamed, leaping at her habitually dining-and-dashing teacher with an electrically charged chakra scalpel.

Later, Ino would realize that charging Kakashi-sensei head-on was a Very Bad Idea, with capital letters.

* * *

 _Jiraiya's House_

"Get rid of that goddamn dog now," Jiraiya growled.

Naruto turned his nose up. "You're just jealous he likes me more than you." As if agreeing with its master, Nekomaru (seriously? SERIOUSLY?) barked.

 _That insolent little…_ Jiraiya wondered who was more to blame for his disrespectful behavior, Kushina or Kakashi, because Minato sure as hell had been the nicest, most obedient kid on earth. It was always those damned K's causing trouble. "If that little dog gets hurt in any way, I take no responsibility, understand?"

Little, of course, as in, big enough to carry both Jiraiya and Naruto on its back. The thing was more wolf than dog, with all the grace of a jaguar, hence its name.

"Fine, fine," Naruto allowed the dog to disappear in a puff of smoke. "Now can we spar?"

"I'll kick your ass all the way to next Thursday."

If Sarutobi-sensei had given him such a statement when he was Naruto's age, Jiraiya would have taken that as an invitation to boast of the opposite. But instead, Naruto only accepted that as fact. "Fine by me. I need to know exactly how far behind I am."

Jiraiya sent out a massive gust of wind that dispersed Naruto's remaining clones. "Hit me with your best shot."

Now, Jiraiya had seen Naruto do plenty of crazy things, from ripping out entire trees by the roots with a single breath to downing an entire bottle of pepper sauce with no lasting side effects. But what Jiraiya _hadn't_ been prepared for was Naruto's "best shot" not being the same as his most powerful attack.

Little brat had thrown dust in his eye.

Fuming, Jiraiya quickly took off after the kid, though not before he created two clones and sent them off to hide (and presumably tag the locations of any other clones Naruto had also created). The result was one clone nearly falling into a pit trap that he hadn't been sure when the kid had time to dig, while the other disturbed a tree full of nesting woodpeckers during the chase and received a faceful of angry bird for his trouble.

It seemed he had chosen to play a defensive game today, which meant that sometime in the next five minutes there was going to be an ambush. Kid was fast, Jiraiya would give him that. He'd spent his childhood pranking and escaping from older, far more trained ninja, though, so Jiraiya wasn't surprised in the slightest.

First came the smoke bombs, clouding his vision. Then the underground wire traps, set while he was fighting off the distractions that came with the smoke. And then the pit traps revealed when he dodged the wire traps. Of course, whether it was counting shot glasses or layers of attacks, Jiraiya was too awesome to stop at three –

The tiny pinpricks of blood on his cheeks were all the warning Jiraiya got before his entire face was shredded. Luckily, he'd had the foresight to summon a ball of water, and managed to get the majority of whatever Naruto had thrown at him off his skin before it could do any lasting damage. _That wasn't just dust,_ Jiraiya realized. Hidden in the clump of mud were thousands of tiny splinters – no, not splinters; they were hairs, only a few millimeters long. Not enough to seriously injure someone but definitely irritating in numbers.

 _Where the hell did he learn to do that?_

Jiraiya lobbed a fireball in the direction of the real Naruto, tossing him off-balance and taking out a few of his clones in the process. While the smoke was still everywhere, the remainder of Jiraiya's clones triggered the chakra trap underneath Naruto's feet, but in the end it was a clone that took the hit.

Funny how the clones loved aiming for the eyes. Seemed like Naruto wasn't just spamming kage bunshin for the sake of numbers – every time they dispersed, they left behind puffs of smoke that could obscure vision just as well as the Hiding in the Mist technique –

Hiding in the Mist.

Shit.

That was _exactly_ what Naruto was doing.

Naruto hadn't yet completely mastered his water-style transformation yet; though he had the stamina, his still shoddy control required his jutsu to be localized and dependent on nearby sources of water. But during the earlier attacks, where Naruto was running away from him, letting him stumble into simple Academy-level traps, obscuring his vision with clones – that was a ploy to draw him into the real trap.

Neither of them could see each other, but that didn't matter considering Naruto had been trained in blind combat and scent tracking. Only Jiraiya's Jonin-level detection skills would even out the playing field.

 _Naruto already knows where I am anyway,_ Jiraiya thought, and threw another ball of fire to chase away the mist in his local vicinity. _Here goes nothing –_

There was cold steel against the back of his neck.

"Gotcha," Naruto smirked.

Jiraiya smirked back. "Did you really?"

The smile dropped off Naruto's face, and that was when Jiraiya jumped in picked him up from behind, popping the clone in the process. "Dammit!" Naruto struggled. He turned around with a tired grin. "When did you substitute? I know it was the real you that walked into the mist…it must have been right when you lit that fireball, huh?"

Jiraiya nodded in confirmation, rubbing at the miniscule cuts on his cheeks from the beginning of the match. "I haven't taught you my hair techniques yet."

Naruto shrugged. "I watched you do your hair jizo thingamabobber and figured the rest out out on my own. Kinda. They're still super brittle." He picked one of his longer hairs from his head and demonstrated for Jiraiya – it held its shape without drooping, but snapped easily when bent. "I know the chakra's not aligned properly, but every time I try, the hairs keep popping out from the pressure of the built-up energy before I can pack enough inside. That's why I saved these little clippings from the barber's."

Jiraiya was surprised that Naruto managed to understand that much about the underlying chakra theory, considering he hadn't mentioned anything about that yet. Then again, this was the kid Yamato said was capable of elemental fusion without any kekkei genkai. Jiraiya hadn't believed it when he first heard it, either, but Yamato had the soil samples to prove it. The poor bastards stationed on Wave were still cutting their feet on random specks of volcanic glass in that patch of sandstone every now and then.

That freaking kid. He was a ridiculously fast learner, even without the clones. It had taken Jiraiya weeks to accomplish what Naruto had within a few hours.

"Why didn't you tell me you were practicing this one? I could have taught you."

"Yeah, but then I couldn't have surprised you in this spar."

Jiraiya rolled his eyes. Of course. "Until it can puncture steel armor, it's not good enough. And you'll need more than this to fight off the Akatsuki."

"I'm not afraid of them. Getting strong enough isn't a problem. But I don't want my friends to get stuck in the crossfire." Naruto looked up at him, mouth set in a determined line. "Shikamaru and Ino have both already led B-ranks, meaning the next one is going to be mine to lead. And since every important mission we've been on so far has ended up going seriously wrong because of something that totally wasn't our fault, I'd like to be prepared. Just _once_ , I want a mission that _isn't_ a D-rank turning out to be exactly what the papers said it would be."

Jiraiya rubbed his chin. "Well, your training break − "

"Probation period."

" – expansion of one's vocabulary is a key tool for political success, kid – as I was saying, your training break ends tomorrow. So I guess we'll see."

* * *

 _The Hokage Tower_

"I swear," Naruto declared, holding the mission scroll in his hands, "if _anything_ screwy happens during this B-rank that turns it into _not_ a B-rank…"

"…we'll mark it as another regular occurrence in the lives of Team 7?" Shikamaru asked drily.

"…Yeah," Naruto muttered sheepishly.

If anyone had asked him months ago if he was ready to lead a B-rank, he would have jumped at the chance. After seeing the trouble both Ino and Shikamaru had gone through, however, he was wondering if something else was going to go wrong, something completely unrelated to the mission just springing up on them out of nowhere, just to complete the cycle.

Knowing the way their luck ran, probably. _Go to Tanyu to pick up the Daimyo, transport him to the Land of Iron for a week-long economic conference with the other Daimyo, take him back to Tanyu, and then go home._

 _Oh yeah, and spy on the other Daimyo for us, please, and thank you._

But Naruto had learned by now that nothing was ever going to be easy. Anything sounding that simple was bound to go wrong. There was a massive difference between being optimistic and being stupid. Being happy about life, like he normally was, didn't mean he could ignore the bad stuff, too.

Like Shikamaru always said – if you had a source of light, there would be a shadow somewhere else. Good and bad things came in pairs. That was the way the world worked.

But they couldn't hide in Konoha forever. He was a shinobi and he would do his duty. Just yesterday, Konohamaru had mentioned something about a Lightning Country ambassador, and Naruto didn't have to be a genius to realize exactly what was going on. _So that's what the Hokage's up to,_ he thought. _If we manage to form an alliance with Kumo, we would not only be preventing an Iwa-Kumo power bloc that could possibly go to war with us, but also set up a monopolization of the coastline that would further weaken the inland nations._

That all, of course, rested on _if_ the plan succeeded. Another reason why they had to go – of all the open teams right now, theirs was the one with the most experience in civilian court politics.

This mission was just as important to the village as it was to the Daimyo, for economics and war were heavily intertwined. Missions assigned by the Hokage were always more important than external client requests, no matter how much they pretended otherwise. Konoha served her best interests, and survival was much more important than money. Failing a client's mission meant a loss of business; failing a Konoha mission could lead to the deaths of your teammates, your friends, and even the village itself…

"Meeting at my place in around an hour?" Naruto asked Ino and Shikamaru. "Bring whatever stuff you found on your own. Oh, and Shikamaru, Jiraiya said he had a couple of extra sealing notes lying around, if you wanted to use them."

Shikamaru nodded. "If you could, that would be great. I solved my first problem, but I found another one, and Kakashi-sensei's notes say nothing about it."

"Why, what happened?"

"Well, when I send chakra from one scroll to another, it works fine, no problem. Most of the chakra makes it through, and I lose maybe a tiny percent to friction, but energy is still conserved. Then, I tried to make the process more efficient by compressing the chakra into a seal – and it still works, like the chakra transfers without issue, but the ink doesn't transfer with it. The matter is stuck on one side of the link, and then the chakra simply burns a mirror image of the ink pattern onto the receiving scroll."

"So you can send energy, but not things?"

"Basically. There's something trapping the ink in its place."

It was interesting, the idea of having friends over at "his" place. Naruto was still getting used to referring to Jiraiya's home as his. Though Naruto had slept over at the Nara and Yamanaka clan compounds before, the reverse hadn't been true until now. His apartment hadn't been much in comparison, and neither Ino nor Shikamaru had wanted to intrude and put him in a situation where he felt uncomfortable.

But now was not the time to dwell upon the past. Naruto was finally getting to lead a mission, a real one and not some dumb garbage-collecting D-rank. The pressure not to screw up was even higher for him, considering how precarious his position was following the Wave incident.

He wondered if Iruka-sensei had ever expected this. Perhaps. Iruka-sensei had always believed in him. But the idea of the village idiot ever getting to do serious work of his own volition was probably an abstract thought for the distant future, when he was all grown up. _Technically this_ is _the future, and I am already all grown up,_ he thought to himself. _Then again, I probably am forever twelve in the mind of an Academy instructor like Iruka-sensei._

"I wonder what Kakashi-sensei's Academy instructors had to say of him," Naruto wondered aloud. "Do they respect his power as a Jonin, now that he's far surpassed them, or do they still look upon him as a child, like Jiraiya does?"

"I doubt they even remember much of him," Ino said. "He only spent a year in there."

"Jonin instructor, then."

Ino shot a worried look at the doorway leading into the other room, where their teacher was speaking with Jiraiya about some private matter. Luckily, neither had noticed the possibly dangerous contents of their conversation yet.

"They're dead, aren't they," Shikamaru said flatly.

Ino frowned. "I don't know if we should be talking about this without him here. The things he told me were all by accident. But it does explain why he's so, you know…overprotective."

"Well, we _are_ his students," Naruto replied. "I bet you, when we're adults with students of our own, he's going to be that senile old dude that keeps requesting Genin to sweep the sunlight off his front lawn. He'll still call us his 'cute little students' and then _our_ students will be his 'adorable tiny grandstudents'."

Ino swatted at him with her book and pointed in the direction of the other room, "Don't give him ideas!" she scolded, stifling a giggle.

"Kashi-chan," Shikamaru murmured.

Naruto frowned. "What?"

Shikamaru shook his head. "Sorry. No, in the sealing notes Kakashi-sensei dumped on me. One of those notebooks had the Fourth Hokage's experiment logs in them, and – this was before he became the Hokage, when he was still a Jonin – he'd write notes to himself in the margins. You know, like shopping and to-do lists. And in one of them he wrote about 'getting a C-rank for Kashi-chan'. Sounds a bit weird, I know, but what else do you call a six-year-old Chunin?"

"Whoa, so the Fourth Hokage was like, a real person!" Naruto exclaimed sarcastically.

"His name was Minato," Shikamaru whispered. "The Sandaime managed to destroy most of the information on him, but of course he couldn't get his hands on the sealing notes because Jiraiya was holding on to them, outside of the village, at the time. Besides, good fuinjutsu resources are too rare."

"Wait – Minato?" Naruto searched through his brain, trying to remember why that sounded so familiar. "Right! The toads!" He quickly explained how Jiraiya had tried to get him to sign the toad contract, only it was too late after he'd signed Kakashi-sensei's dog contract. "The last guy to sign the toad contract after Jiraiya was Minato Nami-something."

"Namikaze."

"So…Kakashi-sensei's teacher was the Fourth Hokage? Who was Jiraiya's student?" Naruto couldn't help it; his face split into a grin. "Neat!"

The guy was still an asshole, though. For ruining Naruto's life. But he was sorta a cool asshole, Naruto supposed, if he could call Kakashi-sensei "Kashi-chan" and get away with it.

Shikamaru cleared his throat. "You were saying before, something about more sealing notes from Jiraiya?"

"Oh, right!" Naruto jumped up. "Jiraiya said he was going to look for them this morning, but then he got sidetracked. Even if we asked him now it's probably going to take him at least another hour to find what he was looking for. Seriously, he has _zero_ organizational skills, and that's a lot coming from me. Come on, they're probably in the attic somewhere."

"Hopefully it'll be better than Kakashi-sensei's shed," Ino smirked.

Naruto agreed, "Well, yeah, Jiraiya isn't _that_ bad."

Like any skilled ninja, Jiraiya's personal belongings were guarded to the nines with all sorts of traps and seals. Nothing lethal, though – they were designed to capture potential thieves for questioning, not kill them. Naruto lost a few clones, but for the most part they managed to make it through unscathed.

"Think it's this box?" Ino asked.

"Would help if someone here had a Byakugan."

"Nah, not it," Shikamaru said. "It's not very heavily guarded at all. I can break through these seals in about thirty seconds, tops." He sparked a bit of chakra around the lock for a bit, and then the lid came off easily. There were a few old notebooks in there, scribbled over in Jiraiya's handwriting, along with a few letters. "Publishing companies. These must be his old notes for _Icha Icha_."

"I wonder what Kakashi-sensei would pay for this," Naruto giggled, rifling through the pages. "Wait a second, this isn't _Icha Icha_ …"

"The Tale of the Utterly Gutsy Shinobi?" Ino read aloud. "Right, that was his first book that didn't sell well."

"There's a note stuck to it." Shikamaru pointed.

"Where?"

"There, on the inside – no, other inside cover – there, you got it – "

Naruto peeled the faded, dirt-encrusted sticky note off the yellowed paper and glanced at the handwriting. It was extremely neat (though that might have simply been his low standards to begin with), though also liberally sprinkled with cheerful loopy scripts.

 _Hey Jiraiya! You weren't home so I stuck it through your mailbox; hope you don't mind._

 _Anyway – I was only planning to read one chapter a day, but I ended up staying way past my bedtime instead. Whoops! Well, at least you get your proofread first draft back few weeks early._

 _First off, this thing has a really solid plot and a really exciting style! Just the perfect type of shonen-manga-esque adventure that I love. It's a bit mature and heavy in some places, however. I liked it, but I'm not sure if it'll sell well. Even if it doesn't, though, I don't think you should change it. You already make enough from missions without needing to sell out on your art. If this book does make it through the screenings, it could potentially have a lot of impact on our world._

 _Some caveats: I think you should cut down on some of the comic relief. Specifically, the inappropriate jokes. If you want this story to change things, you've got to have it appeal to audiences of all ages. It wouldn't do to have a bunch of people automatically dismiss a good story just because of some bad jokes. I mean, I'm used to it, but other people might not be. Save them for another story, I suppose._

 _Otherwise, I really, REALLY like the message around the main hero. He's just the sort of role model more people need. If all the Kage were as open to peace and friendship as Naruto Musasabi, the world would be so much more hunky-dory._

 _I showed this to Kushina, too, if you don't mind. She might be more obsessed with this story than I am. Now she even wants to name our first kid −_

And just like that the laughter died in Naruto's throat.

Lead weights sunk into his stomach. Naruto forced himself to turn the note over and keep reading.

− _Naruto, can you believe it? Or Naruko if it's a girl, I guess. Initially I was planning to name him or her after some historical characters (you know the type of nerd I am, haha) but the more I think about it, the more I agree with her. That way, he or she gets to live up to the mantle of your hero instead of some random old man in a book who already died. Not sure who Kushina wants to be the godmother yet, but I was planning to ask you to be the godfather. :)_

 _Thanks for the great read!_

 _Your student,_

"Naruto? Naruto! There you are – "

Jiraiya froze as he saw the letter in Naruto's hands. Wordlessly, Naruto turned it over and displayed the signature on the back, scrawled in the same exact style as the most recent name on the toad contract.

 _Minato Namikaze_

"…Crap."

* * *

 **A/N: Thanks to mothaibabon for making me a TV Tropes page!**

 **tvtropes [dotorg] /pmwiki/pmwiki [dot php] /Fanfic/ChiaroscuroFanfic**

 **A clickable link is also at sites [period] google [dotcom] /view/boomvroomshroom, or on my profile.**

 **P.S. On a scale of 1 to Pein how screwed is Jiraiya right now?**


	50. Board Game Night

BONUS #n

 _Orochimaru, and Konoha Child Prodigy Disillusionment Syndrome_

 _[wwwdot] fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/163182365/1/Bonus-40-Orochimaru_

* * *

 _Jiraiya's House_

Naruto blinked.

He was no idiot. He knew what this meant.

What he didn't know was what this meant _for him_.

All of a sudden he was brought back to the first time he had tried eating natto. Like many young children, the powerful fermented sensation had been too much for him. He'd almost spit the stuff out, except he had been hungry, and common sense (plus the fact that it had been a free sample) had won out over his initial reflexes. What resulted was…not entirely pleasant, but enough for him to eventually get used to and enjoy it.

Food and feelings went hand in hand for Naruto. Anyone who had experienced true hunger in their lives before could say the same. Ashes and sorrow had a taste of their own, and here he was, swallowing something oddly bittersweet; all these different flavors burning their way down into his stomach. Unrestrained joy. ( _I had parents. A mom and dad who loved me very much._ ) Crippling disappointment. ( _They died, and left me behind. The Fourth Hokage did this to me; he chose to give me, his own_ son _, this curse instead of someone else._ ) Burning anger. ( _I grew up knowing_ nothing _!_ ) Tears of both sadness and happiness, trapping themselves in the corners of his eyes, not knowing which one should come out first.

In the end, none of them spilled.

So he _wasn't_ just a nobody. Some orphan that had gotten picked from the mold the night of the Kyuubi attack. He had had a family. Not just any family. It had been a very special one, at that. He was special. He wasn't picked for no reason. His parents hadn't left him for no reason. They had chosen the village over him. His father had picked him, his own son, rather than force it on any other parent. Now he was left to carry that torch. And yet his heritage hadn't been enough for all that distrust he had received from the village.

 _I hate him. I hate him. I hate hate HATE him._

 _I hate him for everything he's ever done to me. I would have rather been the son of a drunken bum. At least a drunken bum could honestly say he had no choice if the Hokage ordered him to give up his son as a human sacrifice for a Tailed Beast._

 _And yet…_ Had that son been anyone other than _himself_ , Naruto would have applauded the Yondaime for such a selfless gesture. Wasn't this, after all, the exact type of heroism that Naruto had desperately looked up to and tried to emulate his entire life? Wasn't this the sort of thing he _should_ love someone for?

"And my mother?" he asked, surprised at how bland and emotionless his voice sounded. Inside his head was all turmoil, so much of it that his brain seemed to disconnect from his throat. Was this how trained shinobi – like, actual, trained, ANBU-style robots – felt all the time? So many feelings, and yet so incapable of articulating them?

"Kushina Uzumaki, yes," Jiraiya told him. "One of the most spirited and powerful people I ever knew. Great grand-niece of Mito Uzumaki, the first jinchuuriki of the Nine-Tailed Fox…she was the second. The night you were born, we anticipated the seal on her to weaken, but we never expected it to fail completely. And so now you are the third."

"It's hard to find a person with chakra compatible with a jinchuuriki," Naruto said aloud, more to convince himself than for the benefit of anyone else. "Sealing an incompatible host will cause massive complications. If the Kyuubi was going crazy that night, he wouldn't have had time to run around a wrecked village blood-testing everyone. I, an infant related to the previous two hosts, and someone he conveniently had easy access to _as his own son_ – " Naruto choked back a sob – "would have been the most logical choice for anyone with half a brain – "

"Is that it, then?" Ino jumped up furiously. "Are all of Naruto's children and grandchildren doomed to the same 'duty' for as long as the Nine-Tailed Fox exists? Because it's the _logical thing to do?_ "

Naruto gaped slightly, then quickly snapped his jaw shut. _Why are you still so surprised that she would leap to your defense?_ he asked himself. _We're all family, aren't we?_

"Ideally, they wouldn't be infants. They would be adult volunteers who understood what they were getting into, like Mito Uzumaki."

"But…why? Why didn't anyone tell me? I thought…for so long…" He turned to Jiraiya. "Where _were_ you this whole time?

"That…" Jiraiya took a deep breath. "Your father, you know, was a beloved man by Konoha, which automatically means he was and still _is_ a feared and hated figure by anyone _not_ Konoha. He is the reason why none of our ambassadors to Earth Country can have blue eyes and blonde hair, why we were so secretive about your parentage, why we were planning to wait until after you'd mastered all the nine tails before telling you…"

He understood. He really did. He wasn't a dumbass; he _knew_ that he had been a loudmouth as a child, a trait only amplified by his loneliness. Naruto _knew_ that at that age, if he had been told he was the son of the legendary Fourth Hokage, he would have bragged to anyone who would have listened, climbed on top of the Hokage Mountain and shouted it out to the world. He _knew_ the reasons and excuses because he wasn't a dumbass; he _wasn't_ −

"But that doesn't explain _why no one was there!_ " Naruto gasped. "He was the _Fourth Hokage_! I get hiding his identity from random loose-lipped people! What I _don't_ get is him having _zero_ friends? Trusted ANBU guards? Did – no one – _know_ − "

 _Did they hate the idea of a tailed beast in their home so much that they couldn't look past that –_

"He never intended for you to grow up lonely," Kakashi-sensei spoke up. "He wanted the village to acknowledge you as a hero. Didn't work out that way for him, only by then, he was too dead to make a difference, Jiraiya was out of the mission investigating the reason _why_ the Nine-Tails went loose the night you were born, and I…was running from my problems, trying to kill myself with all the S-rank missions I could get my hands on because I couldn't do it the normal way, and being an all-around coward. And after that, I kept putting it off because I was lazy and sad and all sorts of screwed up, which really isn't a good excuse at all and it was wrong and I'm a terrible human being. There, I said it."

Jiraiya stared at him.

"What? Inoichi Yamanaka said it was helpful to be truthful about my _feelings_." A snort of disgust. At himself, probably.

Naruto laughed. Not a happy one. Losing all of one's teammates over the course of less than a year could do that to a man. He didn't trust Kakashi-sensei to be in the proper mental state to care for a child _now_ , much less the angsty teenage version of himself thirteen years ago.

Kakashi-sensei as an angsty teenager. Naruto would have paid good money to see that. Hah. It was funny because he still acted like an overgrown child all the time.

"Naruto, if you're angry at me," Jiraiya said, "you have every right to be. And I understand if you never forgive me, or if you want to live somewhere else after this. However – "

" – for my own safety, I should still at least carry on with my bijuu training until completion with Yamato?" Naruto interrupted. "That's a no-brainer. I'm not going to purposely hurt myself or my friends over this."

Jiraiya paused. "That's…"

"I'm an adult now; don't act so surprised," Naruto cut him off curtly. "With the Akatsuki running around, I can't afford to be a dumbass little kid anymore. Like it or not, staying with you is still the safest option for me. Anyway. You don't have to worry about me letting my _personal feelings_ compromise the mission and endanger the team. I'll be a good little shinobi for Konoha."

"Naruto, I'm – "

"Don't apologize. There's nothing to apologize for."

"But there is, and – "

"You've housed, clothed, fed, and educated me sufficiently well for the past year. I should be thanking you, really." Naruto gave Jiraiya his biggest smile. "I, of course, harbor no ill will whatsoever, and intend to continue living in amicable peace. I mean, I'm not the only orphan in Konoha, and it wasn't like being alone for my whole goddamn childhood was _that_ bad."

Of course, it was fucking fake as hell, and everyone in the room knew it. Naruto wasn't forgiving shit. _Sorry_ was a useless word that let the guilty absolve themselves of their own guilt while giving nothing back. _Oh, I said sorry; that_ must _make it all better, right?_ No, it fucking wasn't, but keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better, because it definitely wasn't making _him_ feel better.

Jiraiya looked down. "You know…If you ever want to learn any of his techniques, I could teach you."

It was a lot to take in. The full extent of how serious this information was would probably hit him later. For now, Naruto just sat in silence, thinking.

For so long, he had wanted an identity. He had wanted to belong. And now he had that, although, technically, he had had Team 7 as his family long before he ever found out about his real family. It was a strange experience. And he wasn't sure which way he wanted to go anymore.

He loved his father, because he was his _father_.

He hated the Yondaime, because that man was basically the cause of all his misery and abandonment issues and all the darker sides of him he wished he could just get rid of so he could truly be happy all the time instead of just acting like he was. The part of Naruto that yearned for acceptance wanted to make his father's memory proud. The angry part of Naruto wanted to pretend it never happened.

What was he going to do?

 _It's your legacy,_ said the bright and hopeful child.

 _It's the legacy of a man who ensured you would grow up_ without _one_ , the poison in his mind hissed.

And suddenly Naruto knew the answer.

Life dealt honor and spite in pairs. The wonderful little subtleties of opposites were no longer lost on him. Naruto could play this game of love and hate, too, could wield the blade that both cut and healed.

His parents could have been aliens from outer space for all he cared, but he would still make himself a _somebody_ , even without their names to ride on. He would honor them, by living to his full potential. And he'd rebel, too, because that's what young teenagers trying to escape the shadow of their parents did.

"I won't lie," he said slowly. "Those techniques he invented are really useful. But…"

"But…?"

"I can't surpass the previous Hokage simply by copying them. No," Naruto decided, "I'm going to forge my own path. The Yondaime didn't have to rely on _his_ father to become strong...and neither will I."

One day, he would definitely learn the Hiraishin and Rasengan, because he'd be an idiot to disregard the power of those techniques over personal issues. But before that, he'd work to earn his own reputation, and maybe, one day, when people looked at him, they wouldn't think _jinchuuriki_ or _monster_ or _the Yondaime's son_ but _Naruto Uzumaki,_ in the same way Butsuma Senju's claim to fame was not _the last great Senju warlord_ but _father of the Shodaime_.

 _If my parents were alive,_ Naruto wondered, _would they be proud of me for being different, or disappointed that I rejected them?_

Naruto shrugged, feeling the invisible weight of his knowledge sliding off his shoulders.

And as he did so, he realized something.

He didn't care.

 _If they truly loved me, then they would be happy for my accomplishments. And if they wanted me to be like them, they shouldn't have died and left me without any of their influence growing up._ Except it wasn't their fault they were dead, and it wasn't his fault they weren't there, and it was nobody's fault except the fox's.

 _Hey, brat, it wasn't my fault either,_ the fox snapped.

 _Then whose fault was it?_

 _Fuck if I know. You try remembering anything when a Sharingan is screwing up your brain._

"So, are we done here? Because we still have a mission to do." Naruto stood up, feeling a lot better now that he'd given both Jiraiya and Kakashi-sensei a proper dressing-down.

Really, it wasn't even _that_ big of a deal…yeah, he had a crap childhood, but that was history. Life was a lot better now and he wasn't going to let some bad memories ruin that. He'd always found simply talking about something to be a good way to convert anger into determination.

* * *

 _Tanyu_

I still remembered the shock and awe I had experienced when arriving in Tanyu for he first time, back when we were still rookie Genin fresh out of the Academy on our first ever C-rank. Now that this was our third time here, the surprise had diminished a little, but the city was still no less impressive. The transition from a provincial ninja village that we had lived in all our lives, to the bustling capital city of the most populous of the Five Elemental Nations, was still as jarring as ever. The difference – we were simply more used to the unexpected. A large city was nothing compared to a veritable army of mysterious attackers.

(I knew those guys had something to do with Orochimaru, because I had seen the sealing plans on my father's desk, along with a form of authorization for permanent destruction. Served the bastard right.)

What was the great big metropolis in comparison to everything we had been through? A crowd of suspicious civilians was better than no crowd at all, better than a field of corpses.

"Don't you dare stop and cause a twenty-cart pileup," Ino warned Kakashi-sensei sharply, as we neared the intersection.

"For your information, I have never caused a twenty-cart pileup," Kakashi-sensei sniffed. "More like…seven."

"I'd rather you do zero," Ino muttered.

It was a quick walk to the Daimyo's apartments; like before, the crowd cleared before them fairly quickly, either out of deference or fear. Luckily, this time around, Kakashi-sensei did not go out of his way to congest traffic, except for one incident involving a sack of barley meal bursting open in the middle of, once again, the busiest square in the city, which attracted all of the stable animals in the vicinity – all "accidentally", of course.

"There is a limited amount of chaos available in the universe," Kakashi-sensei explained. "Therefore, if we create a regular amount of expected chaos, it will deter the unexpected chaos from also joining in, because the space it requires will already be taken up by the chaos we will be prepared for."

"Really," I deadpanned. "And do you have any… _proof_ …for this wonderful theory of yours?"

"No, but in the off chance that there _does_ exist some sadistic god out there, planning out every moment of our lives for the sake of their own entertainment, would you risk it otherwise?"

The one member of our party more excited than the rest was Naruto's newest nin-dog, a tiny puppy that had the potential to end up horse-sized like the others. His army of summons was as varied as it was large; it seemed that there was a dog for any occasion. Bloodhounds for tracking, hunting dogs for capture, greyhounds for message delivery, oversized wolfhounds for fighting, even palm-sized teacup pomeranians for infiltration and information gathering − because who would suspect such a cute little thing that was more fluff than dog?

According to Kakashi-sensei – and I wasn't sure if he was being serious, or if he was just goading Naruto – there was an epic Boss summon somewhere in there that he had met but never been able to take to the human world because of his lack of chakra. I was pretty sure that, boss summon or not, Naruto could make a thousand clones, and each one would be able to summon a dog for themselves and not run out.

The Daimyo entourage took their sweet time in getting themselves organized and getting out on the road, as most nobles with more clothing than sense were apt to do. Naruto had been especially glad for that; it meant he would have more time to go over a last-minute check of everything. We'd learned all too well just what could happen the second we let our guards down.

 _Calm down,_ I told myself. _It's nothing to be worried about. Just remember to be polite, be professional, and be ready to murder each and every single one of them._

Standard advice for a shinobi. That, and _Anything worth fighting for is worth fighting dirty for._

I wondered if we would ever rid themselves of Tanyu. The answer to that was probably no. We had, after all, significantly impressed the Daimyo and his court after the whole debacle with Lady Arakawa.

Ah, well. I could deal with this for a little bit more.

* * *

 _Konoha_

No one had ever invited him to Board Game Night before.

If someone had told Shibi Aburame thirteen years ago that the other clan heads would have remembered to invite him to any event, he'd have broken character and laughed. The Aburame were a noble clan in name only; strong (scary) enough due to their, ah, _numbers_ , but with little political clout. His clan had always been one of loners; their insects usually deterred other people from getting too close to them.

Then again, being constantly forgotten about might not be a bad thing in this situation.

Officially, he was not the only clan head normally not invited to social gatherings; however, one could hardly call a family whittled down to one sole surviving member a real clan. Uchiha and Senju were therefore not present, and naturally the Sarutobi were excluded for obvious reasons.

 _Am I the only one who senses treason?_ he thought.

The five of them – Shikaku Nara, Chouza Akimichi, Tsume Inuzuka, and Hiashi Hyuga – who surprisingly showed up; normally he was too proud to associate himself with any of their 'lesser' clans – were seated around a large blue hexagonal board divided up into smaller hexagons of different colors. There was also a symbolically empty chair in between Chouza and Shikaku which Shibi took to be what was normally Inoichi Yamanaka's spot.

Yamanaka-dono was out on some secret mission; Shibi didn't know what.

Chouza Akimichi made the opening move. "I heard the Sandaime intends to step down soon."

Shikaku Nara went next. "He won't do it without a replacement."

"Which he still hasn't chosen," Chouza Akimichi laid down the final step of the sequence.

"He's got two living students and two living sons, and Konoha has many strong Jonin," said Tsume. "We're not in danger of _no_ replacements."

"True," Shikaku Nara replied. "The trouble lies not in a lack of a suitable replacement, but rather, a successor we are unprepared for. Konoha has only had four Hokage, so there is no precedent there, but history as a whole is full of incidents where complete unknowns suddenly come out of retirement and swing the uninformed masses with some pretty words and well-placed manipulations of a broken system."

"Oh, get to the point," Hiashi Hyuga snarled. "Need I remind _you_ , Shikaku Nara, _why_ Danzo Shimura has holed himself up in a little untraceable assassin-proof bunker for the past several years? All of this purposeless back-and-forth is a result of _your_ nonsense, and the Hyuga clan does not care for – "

Shikaku Nara smirked, and produced a brown folder. "Perhaps you might."

Hiashi Hyuga angrily snatched the package from his neighbor's hands. Slowly, gracefully, with the air of someone who cared deeply but was pretending not to for appearances' sake, he retrieved the papers and placed them on the table.

"What is your game, Shikaku Nara?" he whispered softly, dangerously. "Bringing something like _this_ before our faces? And where did you get it?"

"You don't think I've _really_ spent the past few years doing nothing but lazing about, do you?" Shikaku Nara drawled.

Hiashi Hyuga's eyes darted around the text. With every new line he read, the veins around his Byakugan bulged just the slightest bit more in suspicion.

" _This_ is the official report?" he asked, passing the papers on to Tsume.

"Photocopies of them. But yes."

Tsume Inuzuka threw them down angrily, and declared, "It is garbage."

Shibi quietly reached down to the floor where Tsume had dropped the reports, and began reading them over for himself.

 _The Uchiha Clan Massacre?_

His stomach dropped. _Inoichi Yamanaka must have built up his position in ANBU for_ years _to get his hands on even this little information regarding that night._ Immediately, he could understand Hiashi's trepidation and Tsume's anger. _For such a significant event, the paperwork is unusually sparse._ The reports detailed a great deal of information confirming Itachi Uchiha's guilt, but when it came to the state of the victims, there was only a list of names.

"It proves nothing, only that our paperwork Chunin are incompetent as usual," Hiashi Hyuga argued. "I see no mention of Shimura anywhere in here."

"No, it doesn't," Shikaku shrugged. "It also doesn't mention that that the bodies were all cremated before the ANBU-run autopsies could be verified by the public hospital."

"There were hundreds of them; the public hospital has real patients to worry about."

"Or that prior to burning, said corpses were released into the custody of ANBU instead of a representative of the Uchiha clan."

"Sasuke Uchiha was a child; it was probably official dust under the rug to make things easier for the Hokage."

"Or that the ANBU commander has no recollection of ever having any of these things done." Shikaku tapped his forehead. "Trust me, Inoichi looked thoroughly. He'll be able to tell us even more, once he gets back from his current mission."

"…Perhaps he forgot."

Chouza snorted. "Really, Hiashi? The ANBU Commander, forgetting such a traumatic event? That's the best excuse you can come up with? We have _civilians_ who remember where they were and what they were doing when they heard the news. The mass burnings can be explained away, but the ANBU Commander has _never_ had personal custody over the corpses. Ever."

"It is not simply the ANBU commander who strangely 'forgot' that night," said Shikaku. "ANBU keeps very careful records of their missions, down to operative Cat carrying away the bodies or operative Tiger burning them. And yet, when Inoichi tracked down the identities of the ANBU listed to each task here…half of them only remember carrying the bodies, not examining or destroying them, and the other half do not even exist in our records. ANBU Interrogation, Research, and Development likewise have zero records or memories of this transaction. If you don't believe me, there are plenty of Hyuga who are currently serving in the black ops right now to help you verify my words. It would not take much effort for someone with a Byakugan to discover the same things he did."

"Get to the point."

"I believe you already know exactly what I am talking about, but if you wish for me to spell it out for the table, then fine. What we have here is a motherlode of Uchiha DNA written off as the property of not the Uchiha family, but of a different organization. And yet said organization was completely unaware of ever having this power in the first place. Thus there must be someone else with power within ANBU, who is not actually in ANBU, hiding something from us." Shikaku folded his hands. "And if they can hush up something of this magnitude involving the _Uchiha clan_ …"

"…then it would only be too possible for the rest of us!" Tsume snarled.

"It might be Danzo Shimura. Or it might not be; I haven't mentioned a word to the Hokage. The question is," Shikaku Nara leaned in, "can the Hyuga clan afford to take this risk?"

Hiashi Hyuga's lips pressed into a thin line. His fists clenched. Then he threw his little wooden figurines onto the table, scattering them all over the board, and left without another word.

"Well," Tsume whistled. "That went better than expected."

"Relax," Shikaku said. "We already have him."

"You call that 'having' him?" Tsume asked.

"If he hadn't been interested, he would have dismissed us from the start. Instead, he engaged us in conversation. He cared enough to start making arguments from the opposition's standpoint. That means he was testing the waters, seeing if we had done our research, making sure that it was worth throwing his support in with our lot," Shikaku calmly explained. He began to reset the board, minus Hiashi's pieces. "The seed of doubt has been planted. And doubt, Tsume, is where the forests of revolution begin."

 _Treason,_ thought Shibi. _We could get killed for this._

"Worry not, my friend. If the revolution involves less than ten unfortunate accidents, then it is called politics, and that is perfectly legal." Shikaku passed the dice to Shibi. "Besides, it is not as if we are here to seize control for our own selfish personal desires – only to prevent someone else from doing the same."

Shibi rolled the dice.

A three and a four. Seven total. "I see. Along the same vein, say good-bye to your stone monopoly, Shikaku."

Torune and Fuu had been taken first, but they wouldn't even be here in the first place if it hadn't been for Yoshino Nara's son. This meeting of clan heads only existed because Shikaku Nara had taken the time to call them all here. Shikaku Nara had only taken the time to call them all here because Danzo Shimura got greedy and decided to try his luck at kidnapping a clan heir.

It was strange, how so many things could change because of one life. Had that one child been born a little more lazy, a little less significant, all those years ago, none of this would be happening right now. But there was no use wondering about things that could not be changed, because the fact remained: in collecting his army of child prodigies, Danzo Shimura had made a fatal mistake.

He had made an enemy of Shikaku Nara.

* * *

 **A/N: If you liked the Tanyu arc, then good news, because the next chapter will have quite a bit of politics. If you didn't like the Tanyu arc, then good news, because after that – well, I won't spoil it, but…**

 **Action is coming.**

 **(Sorry, Ned Stark.)**

 **By the way, thanks for all the reviews last chapter, because I was totally unprepared for that. Hopefully Naruto's reactions in this one lived up to your expectations? Constructive criticism for this chapter would be appreciated.**


	51. Shifting Desert Winds

_The Land of Iron_

Within a few days, we'd made it to the site of the conference an entire day ahead of schedule, with – get this – absolutely no problem whatsoever. As in, not even a single untrained civilian robber. Nothing.

Naturally, this meant that none of us slept well that night. This was, after all, Team 7. Given the way our past two high-ranking missions had gone, something was bound to happen to us sooner or later.

And yet, nothing did happen. We got them settled in, did our patrols, and came up with nothing. There was a tiny run-in with another shinobi team from Cloud, two Chunin and their recently promoted Jonin teammate, but no blows were exchanged.

Kakashi-sensei even kept his mouth shut for once and let Naruto do the talking. Naruto politely exchanged a few greetings with their team leader, explained that our team was here for the Fire Daimyo, learned that they were similarly present for the Lightning Daimyo, and left them to their own devices.

We might have spied on them a little bit, but it was just regular spying and not, you know, _spying_ spying, as in malicious, in-depth state-sponsored-secret-stealing infiltration. Shinobi performed standard intelligence sweeps all the time, as part of protocol, kind of like how card sharks and poker players and businessmen were always lying to each other as part of the game without it necessarily meaning backstabbing.

It was just how we worked, what we expected of each other. They were definitely doing the same to us. Sure, simply _telling_ each other these basic things would have achieved the same result, but then it would be too easy.

"Maybe Kumogakure is also hoping to score an alliance with us," Ino mentioned hopefully.

"That would be great if that happened," I said. "But don't bank on it. They were also talking to the Rock nin that were also here. It's part of their foreign policy; they like to keep their options open while being on no side but their own."

Naruto sighed ruefully. "Isn't that everybody, though?"

The morning the conference began, we were part of the Daimyo's initial escort group into the discussion chamber. This time, it was Naruto, as the mission leader, who occupied the position of "honor" beside the upper half of the Daimyo's right flank. Ino, our resident sensor, was taking up the front, and I was on the left side of the procession, in the lower half, closest to Kakashi-sensei, who brought up the rear. We were surrounded by mostly servants, which was fine by me; there was, after all, someone I needed to talk to.

"We meet again, young man."

"Butterfly. How nice of you to be here. Congratulations on your new position, by the way."

She smiled. Somehow, behind her aged wrinkles, her eyes seemed to carry the mirthful expression of a particularly mischievous two-year-old. Then again, it wasn't as if Kakashi-sensei was much better. "That is very kind of you. But I am only a mere maid."

Yes, a mere maid. First in direct service to Lady Arakawa, and now under the Daimyo's lead economic advisor. Whose rooms she undoubtedly had access to. For cleaning purposes, of course, because _who, me? I'm just a cleaning lady, I can't even read! Tee-hee!_ "And I'm just a Genin," I retorted.

She laughed. "Still?"

"Hey, the average age to Chunin is seventeen, so I've still got a little over three years," I told her, mock-defensively. "Not that age is a problem for you."

The Butterfly took a swipe at my head. "Didn't anyone ever teach you not to mention a lady's age? I suppose they teach different things in ninja villages."

"Oh, you're a lady now? I thought you were a mere maid," I smirked.

Her nose turned up at me, and she sniffed derisively. "Insolent."

We continued to exchange barbs and information on the road to the Land of Iron. To my simultaneous glee and horror, Ino and the Butterfly had gotten to know each other personally. And oh, did they get along _splendidly_. Seeing the two of interact was like watching a soap opera. No – not that. It was a great deal more complicated than that. They weren't just two women chatting about insignificant things. The silly gossip that passed between them all had a purpose, on some level; they were _sizing each other up_. And sometime between the starts and ends of their conversations, Ino had managed to gain the absolute respect of the Butterfly in the best possible way, for the woman had deemed her impressive enough to take the time to converse with on a regular basis.

But Ino had also been clever about it, for she had not presented herself as a threat, but as an ally; for all of her skill as a negotiator (and a gossip-mongerer) she would never replace the Butterfly's position in the Daimyo's court. The reasoning was simple enough. From the start, she had made it clear that their spheres of influence were completely different, and therefore, no challenge between the two of them would be necessary. Their relationship was an exchange, not a competition.

(From that bloomed the start of what would one day be the world's most powerful information brokerage circle.)

That was the success story of the Butterfly. As long as she had all the blackmail she had, no one could get rid of her; otherwise, she'd just go to someone else and spill everything, and she had a _lot_ to spill. But as long as she remained where she was, she could continue to gather her blackmail. It was this exact kind of catch-22 that made her impossible to remove, her cycle of information gathering infeasible to break. Like a debtor running from his moneylenders because seeing them would force him to pay back loans he didn't have, and yet the very act of delaying the payments was only spiking up the interest even more and making things even worse.

Most importantly, however, was the fact that, her relative level of danger was truly low, and she was smart enough not to do anything that would warrant an execution. She had found and settled that comfortable medium between influential but not powerful enough that making her a direct target would be worth the benefit.

* * *

 _The 36_ _th_ _C5 Economic Conference_

Ino took a quick glance around. Noticeably absent was any sign of the delegation from Wind Country, which was odd because their money-mindful Daimyo had been among the first to RSVP. There was a conspicuously empty swath of table where they were supposed to be seated, the unused seats innocently gaping at the rest of the meeting hall.

"Oh, whatever," the Earth Daimyo yelled. "Let's start without them; it's not like that desert has anything useful to contribute."

"Hold on; I think we should give them one more day," an accountant from the Land of Grass said. "They might have been held up by something that wasn't their fault."

The Lightning Daimyo disagreed. "I'm sick and tired of waiting. Let's get on with it already. This is an economic conference. Time is money, money is time, and time waits for no one, so why should we wait for them? I say if it is not their fault for being late, then it is not ours either, and we should not have to bear the burden of their tardiness. I don't care if they were caught in some freak desert storm. They should have thought to leave earlier if that was the case."

That little speech got the whole room to murmur in agreement, and with that, the debate began. Money and power went together like milk and cookies, and alliances were formed and broken at economic conferences just as often as at summit meetings. Wind Country would simply have to deal with whatever unfortunate turn of events sought to hold them up.

During the debates, Naruto's clones, disguised as civilian servants, were wreaking havoc. Not in his usual way, which would often involve brightly coloured paints and maybe some fire. Instead, he had been armed with something a little more subtle, though no less destructive.

The failed experiment Shikamaru had been tossing around the day before they left on this mission turned out to be fantastic in transferring information – especially in the specific case where you did not want to destroy the original copy. The seals, compressed onto thin strips of bookmark-shaped silk, were like tiny radios, but for written words instead of sounds.

So instead of stealing, memorizing, or painstakingly taking pictures of the other nations' financial ledgers, they could just slip one of the transcription seals into the inside cover, and within minutes all of that information would be transferred into blank books lying safely in Shikamaru's possession. Someone back home would be happy to have those accounts; it would certainly be useful in calculating the total manpower and money a possible rival could raise in wartime.

The information from the ledgers corroborated with Naruto's dogs' counts of the shinobi present, as well as the verbal information Ino had extracted from the dignitaries present. Overall, the money each nation was pumping into their military sectors hadn't changed much, though all had seen minor increases when it came to hidden village subsidies.

All the while, Kakashi-sensei…hung around and did Kakashi-sensei things.

"Excuse me, can you hold this?"

"Of course."

Many a poor soul had been left standing in the middle of the hallway with a completely pointless vase in their hands.

By the end of the night, they had successfully gathered intel on the smaller nations, as well as the group from Water Country, which had no ninja accompanying them, and Earth Country, which Kakashi-sensei had taken upon himself to do because anything involving Iwa was risky. Ino still wasn't sure how asking random people to hold pointless vases was helping Kakashi-sensei spy on the notoriously prickly Iwa nin, but it probably had something to do with distracting any potential witnesses.

Perhaps it was a testament to Naruto's ridiculously amazing luck that nothing happened while they were at the conference. No unexpected murders or suspicious accidents. The entire conference was as civil as could be. In comparison to most other international meetings, anyway. Naruto had accidentally ruined more than one of the Sandaime's tea parties in his youth.

Lightning Country was as strong as ever, as was the Hidden Cloud, both in their military and economic rankings and in their relationships with each other. Unlike with the case of Sand, Konoha would have a much harder time getting any sort of advantage over them. Earth Country, at least, was more tenuous in position, given their landlocked location.

In any event, Earth Country and Lightning Country were civil with one another. Earth Country _had_ to be on good terms with Lightning Country, for they were further inland and relied on the ports of Lightning Country to get any sort of imported goods. This had the potential to be dangerous for Konoha; if for some reason Kumogakure decided that the militaristic Iwa was worth turning their backs on the economic might of Konoha and Fire Country for, it would leave Konoha alone in the world and surrounded by enemies on all sides.

This was par for the course, however. Konoha had been dancing around its delicate power balance since forever. As far as anyone was concerned, this was completely normal and fine.

The same couldn't be said outside of the conference. But there hadn't been a single peep from Wind Country and Sunagakure.

By now, everyone was sure that something was up. No delegates or messengers from there had shown up; not a single merchant or Sand nin. It was as if the Wind Daimyo and his family had completely disappeared off the face of the earth. And no one knew why. All communications had suddenly gone silent overnight. It was like that entire area had suddenly disappeared off the map. A couple of late people cancelling at the last minute, fine. But when intel suddenly stops pouring in (the peace treaties from the last war forbid the use of spies against other villages, but no one _actually_ followed that rule), it was clear that something was wrong.

Where were they, and what were they doing? Was it a coincidence, that their activities had dropped off the radar right when all the other Daimyo were preoccupied with this important meeting? Perhaps they had been delayed along the road somewhere, and the runner they sent ahead to tell everyone else that they'd be late sprained his ankle, Ino hoped. Things like that happened sometimes.

Maybe there was a simple, non-violent explanation for their absence.

 _Hah,_ Ino thought sourly, _as if_.

* * *

 _The Land of Iron_

Naturally, this state of cluelessness regarding Wind Country was unacceptable to any of the hidden villages, and the atmosphere grew more and more tense as time went on. Naruto knew, because they'd caught the Cloud team not-so-surreptitiously (translation: really obviously) spying on them. That was classic ninja-speak for "I want a truce talk, but only with someone who knows as little as I do."

Team Samui introduced themselves and got straight to the point. "Both our villages will want to know what's up with Sunagakure. Likely they'll be sending out a secondary mission anyway. It's more convenient that we, who are already here, retrace the road between Iron and Wind."

"And why should we trust you?" Naruto asked, because that was _always_ what you were supposed to say every time a foreign team came up to propose a joint mission. And for a good reason; though the tragedy of Yosuga Pass was supposed to be between Kiri and Iwa only, it had had a profound lasting effect on any future thoughts of inter-village cooperation.

Samui, the Jonin and leader of their team, said, "Who else is there you would team up with?"

"No one said we had to team up with anyone. A mission like this, either of us could do alone." Naruto didn't like playing the hardliner, but sometimes you had to act tougher than you really were to win at the negotiation table. 99% of the time, misses went low, so you had to aim high.

"We'll cover for you if either of us run into each other or patrols from Sand," Samui tried. "If you do the same for us."

"Sure, we can fib for each other," Naruto conceded, "but what happens if they offer you freedom or information for ratting us out?"

Samui snorted. "Why would we take that offer? That would just let Sunagakure capture both spy teams, and then they would be under no obligation to let either of us leave. Some information is better than no information; if one of us makes it out, our respective villages could barter for what we do have."

Naruto considered this. Cooperation was always welcome, but only if it was genuine. And when it came to ninja, it was always hard to tell. "How do we know you won't just take all the good information for yourself and sell us wrong intel? Then we'd be down a team _and_ working off faulty knowledge."

"That's up to your village leadership. If they can't tell when they're being scammed or lied to, then they deserve whatever's coming to them."

That was true enough. Naruto knew that they also had a similar sort of thing in place when it came to intel on Kirigakure. People competed and fought wars over rare resources, but they had to cooperate out of necessity when it came to near-nonexistent ones.

The Hidden Villages might go to war, as they did every generation, sure. But in general the Daimyo and the Elemental Nations themselves had remained stable for quite some time. Just as the Chunin Exams were a (very ineffective) replacement for war among shinobi, so were the Shinobi Wars replacements for even greater wars among the nations.

The sad truth was, ninja were scapegoats. Their deaths would be just as secretive as their lives. They were there to do the odd jobs like chasing cats and bodyguarding, but they were also there for the purpose of minimizing collateral damage for even higher powers than the Hokage. A potential rebellious minor lord, dispatched before his plans could ever come to fruit, would be missed far less than the thousands of men who would die as a result of his schemes.

If nations under the Daimyo went to war, cities would be burnt and economies would be destroyed. Armies and legions would pit themselves against one another and leave entire battlefields caked with blood. If shinobi went to war, casualties would be limited to less than a tenth – usually more like one twentieth – of that number. Their definition of a "mission" was one successful assassination, a quiet death in the night. A "battle" would be a confrontation between two shinobi; a "curbstomp massacre" meant the deaths of a few hundred people. Meanwhile, a "minor border scuffle" between two nation-states would _normally_ leave at least a few thousand dead, most of them peasant levies without any proper military training.

And they called _them_ the crazy, bloodthirsty ones.

It was the curse of being too efficient for their own good.

"Fine," he reluctantly agreed, but no more than that. "You go your way, we'll go ours, and neither tries to actively or indirectly sabotage the other."

She shrugged, as if she had predicted that this was the best reaction she'd be getting out of them.

"…What the hell is going on?" Shikamaru muttered.

"Beats me," Naruto shrugged. "Which is why we're swinging over to Suna instead of going home after this, because gods forbid, they turn into another Kirigakure."

* * *

 _Sunagakure_

This was it. The point of no return.

The imbalance of power in Wind Country had finally been rectified. She had made a deal with the devil. Now she would pay her dues.

 _And he will pay his_ , Temari thought, straightening her robes. The ninja obeyed their lord, the lord supported his ninja, and if the bastard decided to pull any funny business with her, she would remind him just exactly what the word "shinobi" meant.

 _Mess with me and mine and you will end up like your older brother,_ she thought furiously. _I gave you that title. I can just as easily take it away. Go on. I dare you._

The Daimyo was dead, long live the Daimyo.

The new ruler of Wind Country, the late Daimyo's younger brother, sat consolidating power in his stead. He was, of course, absolutely _devastated_ that his two young nephews, the beloved children of his late brother, were missing, and if either of them turned up alive then of course he would willingly give up his seat to the boys. Again, his current position was _in no way_ an illegal seizure of power; he only intended to temporarily take charge to keep the country in order while a nationwide search for the vanished eighteen-year-old and thirteen-year-old was conducted.

Temari snorted to herself. That man's acting skills were truly a work of art.

But they wouldn't save him if he decided to turn his back on Sunagakure.

She refused to think of the ashes and bones, hidden far out in the desert where no one would find them. She refused to think of the young man her father had once considered a potential match in marriage for her, the young man whose dead body now fertilized the beautiful cactus flowers in the Mirror Oasis. She refused to think of the boy suffocated in his sleep before he had a chance to fully experience life, the boy who couldn't have been much older than Gaara when she had ordered his death.

 _Gaara,_ she thought, ignoring the invisible bloodstains on her long, pale fingers. _Gaara, I did this for you._

The responsibility fell on her shoulders, all of it, but it was all completely worth it, if she could get Gaara back. All of it, was so she could see him again.

She wondered, what would their reunion be like? _We've treated you poorly, little brother._ Would he be angry? Probably. Would he be violent? Also probably. But she had her apologies and everything all planned out. It would be fine. He would hate them, but if she could stage it somehow to make it look as if Konoha was the one at fault, surely he would hate them more. Besides, it wasn't as if Konoha could have done any better with him.

 _He belongs here, in the desert. At home. With us._

There were two sharp raps on her door. With her curt permission to enter, her former teacher stepped into the room.

"Temari – " Baki began.

She immediately cut him off with a vicious glare.

Baki bowed his head. "I apologize. Godaime Kazekage-sama."

Temari smirked and leaned back in her new chair. " _Much_ better."

She couldn't wait to see Gaara again.

* * *

 _Fire Country_

Gaara could hardly contain himself. Today he was finally moving out of the ANBU compound and going to Konoha, where he would meet Inoichi's family.

 _Will they like me?_ he wondered nervously. _Inoichi told me they would, but what if they don't?_ He took a few breaths to steady himself. _Okay, I just have to remember to say hello, and ask them their names and how they're doing, just like he taught me, just like normal people do!…_

It would be easy! He hoped it would be easy.

The Ichibi hadn't talked to him for a very long time. This was a good thing. Gaara's past life was very, very hazy at this point. He remembered that he was unwelcome in Suna, that his own father hated him and his siblings feared him. He also remembered that he had done some bad things, too, but he didn't know what. _Inoichi said I killed people, people who didn't deserve it. This time, things will be different. I'll only defend myself. I won't hurt anyone. Unless I have to, and Inoichi will tell me when and who I have to fight._

He trusted Inoichi to tell him the right people.

"Oh, and I should mention: Ino, my daughter I told you about, doesn't know you're coming yet, because this move is a secret. I'm going to warn you, she _is_ a bit loud and bossy. She also talks a lot, and _loves_ her gossip. She got that from me, I'm afraid." Inoichi chuckled fondly. "But she means well, and she has a good heart. She'll be nice to you; I'll make sure of it. Just don't let her rope you into any of her silly schemes, especially if she tries to offer you money for it."

"All right," Gaara said nervously. Loud, bossy, and blonde. She sounded like another girl he once knew in his memories, though he couldn't for his life remember who.

"You ready? Have everything you need?" Inoichi asked.

Gaara nodded. He didn't have many things to begin with. He was leaving this place with just his clothes and some basic necessities. Ibiki said that they had packed his other things, like his books and lightboard for his sand drawings, away in a sealing scroll. He wouldn't be seeing them during the trip. They'd get to unpack them again, once he arrived in Konoha. He would miss them. Gaara did get one book to carry in his pack, though. _The Tale of the Utterly Gutsy Shinobi_. That one had been his favorite. The Naruto in there was one of his best friends, even though he was imaginary. Maybe the other Naruto, the real person who was named after the character, would be like him. In Gaara's head, the Naruto in the book liked Gaara just as much as Gaara liked him, and they were best friends. So maybe the real Naruto would also like him just as much in real life.

Maybe –

"No, no, no, no, shit, shit, _SHIT!_ " Inoichi hissed.

Gaara's stomach dropped. "Inoichi? What's wrong?"

Inoichi grabbed Gaara and tossed him at the nearest ANBU guard. "Run as fast as you can and don't look back."

Gaara opened his mouth to argue.

Then he saw the red clouds and black cloaks and immediately shut up.

* * *

 **A/N: Oh, Temari. Don't count your chickens before they've hatched.**


	52. From the Ashes

_The Land of Iron_

Naruto was ready to get out of here, but the Daimyo's court had different ideas. Evidently, if _leaving_ had taken an inordinate amount of time, returning home was even slower, because they had to wait for (and occasionally help in) all the packing. And these rich people had a _lot_ to pack. Suitcases always magically seemed to get smaller at the end of a trip compared to the beginning, and that wasn't even counting all the gifts and souvenirs they'd all managed to pick up.

Naruto thought _Ino_ had a lot of clothes, but it was nothing compared to the entire closet of formal kimono and jewelry these people had brought along with them. Their unusual affluence was frankly just mind-boggling to Naruto. Seriously, it was crazy! Who _needed_ all of this stuff?

Well. He _knew_ why. In the royal courts you needed to make an impression. In their social sphere, they needed all of this – stuff – to survive. Just like how ninjas had their weapons. Civilians would probably ask _them_ why they had to pack so many kunai or shuriken or exploding tags, in the same way Naruto wondered why these people had so many clothes. That was just how they fought their own little wars.

A world in which all wars were fought with words and embroidery. As lame as it was, Naruto wished he lived in that world.

But he would never belong in it. For the longest time, Naruto had lasted on two sets of clothes, both of which had the same design. Ever since he had become a ninja, he had been able to get more variety in his wardrobe – but all of it had been for completely utilitarian purposes. Like, green clothes versus desert camouflage or gray mist stuff. And the set of formal wear that had been given to him for the last mission in Tanyu, which he hadn't touched since.

"Goddammit," Naruto muttered. "Kakashi-sensei, as the team leader I demand a story. A good one, too. Not one of those infinite recursive stories that you use to get annoying brats like me to shut up. And you better not read aloud from _Icha Icha_."

Kakashi glared at him over his book. "Are you abusing your position of authority, Naruto?"

Naruto smirked. "I learned from the best. Besides, you owe me several stories about my parents."

Yeah, that's right. He went there. What type of shinobi would he be if he didn't bring out the emotional manipulation?

"All right, all right, settle down, my cute little Genin." Kakashi-sensei closed his eyes. "Once upon a time, there was a technique. This technique was so awesome, that it was awesome."

"Wow. Was it awesome, too?"

"And it was _also_...awesome."

Shikamaru rolled his eyes. "Very descriptive of you. Truly, eloquence fit for the ages."

"Why thank you," said Kakashi-sensei, once again demonstrating his ability to selectively misread sarcasm as he saw fit. "Now, if you want the short explanation, it was a very simple, seal-based, non-chakra intensive teleportation jutsu, and − "

Shikamaru snorted. "Oh, _simple._ Really. A seal-based teleportation jutsu? You'd be jumping dimensions with that."

"That would be the long explanation," Kakashi-sensei interrupted.

"We've got time, sensei," Naruto grinned. "And as designated team captain, I say we all want more storytime from you."

"This technique was not an original technique," Kakashi-sensei continued, surprisingly candid in comparison to his usual self. "It was originally an invention of the Nidaime Hokage, who intended for it to be used as a mode of faster communication. But it was temperamental, complicated, and ultimately more of a mental exercise than a technique with useful applications in war. As a result, it never caught on very well, and people ended up forgetting about it. Until a man named Minato Namikaze came along."

The Yondaime Hokage. Someone that their generation should have grown up under, and yet never got to know. Naruto's breath hitched ever so slightly. They all knew much about the fox, but none of them knew anything about the man who had given it to Naruto.

Maybe Shikamaru had his theories, but beyond that they knew nothing, for that was one of the things Ino's father _wouldn't_ gossip with them about no matter how much they asked, and so Naruto desperately wanted to know what Kakashi-sensei might have to say about him. He would have been old enough to remember.

"Minato-sensei was…how should I put this," Kakashi-sensei trailed off, sounding vaguely sad and nostalgic. "He was…one of the most brilliant men I ever knew. And he was infinitely kind and patient. If you think I'm hard to deal with now, you should have seen me when I was a child. Impossibly selfish, bad-tempered, and antisocial."

"I don't think you're selfish or bad-tempered," Ino said, false sweetness dripping from her voice.

He ruffled her hair. "Despite all of my flawless qualities, he was still definitely a lot nicer to me than I am to you."

Ino snorted.

"In any event," Kakashi-sensei continued. "He was the one who made the Nidaime's obscure technique famous, for he managed to perfect it for use in battle. Through many painful practice sessions, and even more equally painful design sessions, he managed to learn how to deal with the disorientation of a dimension jump well enough to use this technique _hundreds_ of times in rapid succession. That use was what finally gave the technique its name today. It is called the Hiraishin no Jutsu – the Flying Thunder God."

The same technique that had won the war, and one that made Kakashi-sensei dangerous enough to be allowed back out on the field, even with his damaged eye and inert arms.

Kakashi-sensei continued to slip in stories, though he would always stop the second he even got the slightest sense that another living soul had come within hearing distance of them. Naruto listened with fascination, soaking up every drop of information like a dry sponge in a rainstorm. The alternative was watching all these rich people and their poor, overworked attendants figure out how to fold clothing properly.

Eventually, the Daimyo and his people were _finally_ done, and even longer than that for them to reorganize themselves into something fit for travel on the open road and finally arrive back in Tanyu. Never before had Naruto been so glad to drop a client off and just _get out of there_.Those people just walked so _slowly_. Taking to the trees again – now _that_ was something he wouldn't give up for the world. You couldn't get this anywhere else. Konoha was the Village Hidden in the _Leaves_ for a reason, after all.

They hadn't seen the Cloud nin since their meeting. Not that they were meant to rendezvous anywhere, but Team Samui had left surprisingly quickly, even though the Lightning Daimyo was just as slow as all the other nobles. Naruto's clones managed to catch something about a "big cat", whatever that meant.

"There's at least one person in Kumogakure who summons either mountain lions or snow leopards," Kakashi-sensei said. "The only other cat they have is Yugito Nii, the jinchuuriki of the Two-Tailed Beast. Or, it could have been a random code word. Who knows."

"Speaking of 'who knows,' where the hell did all these things come from?" Shikamaru wondered aloud. The side of the road, normally lined with Konoha's famous trees, had been invaded by a random patch of the ugliest wild sunflowers ever known to man.

"They must have fallen out of someone's tent bag," Kakashi-sensei answered.

Shikamaru furrowed his eyebrows. "Normal people don't store sunflower seeds in tent bags."

Kakashi-sensei honest-to-goodness _giggled_.

Naruto simply sighed. There was a group of merchants making their way down the road in the opposite direction; perhaps they would be a better source of news than the isolated Land of Iron. Ino volunteered to go make first contact with them. Upon returning to the group, she informed them of what she had gleaned from their short conversation. "Apparently, the Wind Daimyo was unable to make it to the economic conference because he was ill."

"Ill, or," Naruto formed air-quotes with his fingers, " _ill_?"

"What do you think?"

"Well, you know what they say," Kakashi-sensei said, as they departed the city towards the Land of Wind. "The winds in the desert are always shifting. Actually, the winds everywhere are always shifting, but that's beside the point."

"That's worrisome. If there's even any truth to this rumor…" Shikamaru frowned. "What's Sunagakure up to? And didn't the guy have any sons? Where are they?"

Kakashi-sensei shrugged dismissively. "They're young children. Thirteen and eighteen. They hardly matter."

"Here, now. Thirteen and eighteen are not _that_ young," Naruto argued. He was almost fourteen. That was plenty old enough, to be trusted with missions. And the Third Hokage had started his tenure when he was in his late teens, early twenties.

"For shinobi, perhaps," Kakashi-sensei said, "but they are not shinobi. These boys, trust me. They are children."

As for where those boys were now…no matter how many people they asked, the closer they got to Wind Country, no one knew and no one cared. There were rumors that the younger boy was sick with the measles, while the older one had yet to return from a hunting trip. And then, most worrisome of all – the current sitting Wind Daimyo was the brother of the normal one.

Royal children didn't last long when uncles gained control. Ask any history textbook.

"How much you want to bet that the position of Kazekage has finally been filled after a whole year and a half of this bullshit power wrangling?" Shikamaru muttered.

To become a Kage, one needed the nomination of his or her country's local warlord – in this case, the Wind Daimyo. And given how much that man had isolated his resident hidden village, it must have been child's play for one of his enemies to team up with them. And so, even without ever entering Wind Country, all of them could easily figure out what had gone down. The uncle would get the title, the assassin would get the hat, and as long as they kept doing business together, trade would remain fair. And they would find out whoever the main perpetrator in this affair was once the newest Kazekage was announced to the world

"A fool's bet," Kakashi-sensei said. "I always said pissing off your resident enclave of trained killers was a bad idea."

"The question is, is it safe to continue on with this information gathering mission?" Naruto asked. "Our job was to find out what happened to the Wind Daimyo, and though our information is incomplete we have a good enough idea already."

"Hmmm…what do you think?" Kakashi-sensei asked. "Naruto, you're the team leader. Why don't you tell me?"

Naruto jumped into his explanation immediately. "Chances are, if Sunagakure has really killed him over the whole money issue, then the new Kazekage that backed this operation will be pretty unfriendly to Konoha. And if they've completely shut down the country while they gather up power in the aftermath, like I suspect the've done, then a simple walk-in scan like we did in our first C-rank escorting that merchant won't fly anymore. They would probably try further consolidate their power and show how strong they are by being way more aggressive than usual."

"And if that is the case, what should we do?"

"Well, normally, I would not simply be satisfied with just a few rumours – I would definitely attempt a more comprehensive report. But really, we as a Genin team have already done our end of the mission, which wasn't officially assigned to us in the first place. If central command wants a more in-depth analysis of the situation, best to send a specialized ANBU team for infiltration, or something or that nature. And it's not just me being excessively cautious. Given the current atmosphere, us walking in there won't do us any good, and will definitely result in a risk of capture – which will likely only hurt Konoha even more, because we'd be some pretty high-profile prisoners, giving them an edge in hostage negotiations."

Kakashi-sensei looked at him, and nodded. "That should be a good enough excuse for the Hokage and his advisors. The capture of a jinchuuriki and two clan heirs would outweigh any potential benefits of a minor recon."

"Cool, so we can go home," Naruto said. "Shikamaru, Ino, let's – Ino? Ino, what's wrong?"

Ino had fallen to her knees, clutching her head with her hands.

"My father, he's – "

* * *

 _Fire Country_

"Gaara," Inoichi yelled at the retreating group of ANBU, "if for any reason those two catch up to you, you have my explicit permisson to kill them."

"But I'm not supposed to hurt people – "

"These people are trying to hurt us, so you're allowed to hurt them back." Inoichi said quickly, doing his best to hide the fact that he was absolutely terrified from Gaara. Terrified, as in, no, no, _no_ ; this _couldn't_ be happening – n _o, no, no, no, no…we're barely a few hours away from home, dammit! Why?_

The smaller one of the two stepped forward. Hidan, the wanted cult murderer from Jiraiya's files. He looked strangely young, considering the number of years he'd been active. The other, Kakuzu, was even older, a holdout from the days of the First Hokage. The extent of both of their abilities were relatively unknown.

 _Fuck. Of all the ones we had to get, it was these two._

"Now, now, that wasn't very nice," Hidan smirked. "We only came to say hello, and you order your friends to kill us? I never knew Konoha nin were so impolite." His red scythe flashed in the air. "Well, if you're so certain…"

He barely dodged the massive scythe that the first one had swung at him. In his mind, he was frantically shouting as far as his mental range could go, to any and every Konoha team or outpost in the area that could listen. _ANBU Team Jinchuuriki-1 to central command! Request for immediate backup, 2 hostiles, suspected Akatsuki affiliation – fuck that, definitely Akatsuki – we need help! NOW!_

"Inoichi!" he heard Gaara yell.

Instinctively, he stepped in between the pair of goons and his new charge. He'd spent too much time with the boy, only to let him fall into the hands of the Akatsuki. If Gaara died or was otherwise captured here, all they had worked for up until this point would be for nothing. They would not be getting what they wanted today, not if he had anything to say about it.

"Secret Art: Mind Body Disturbance," whispered Inoichi.

A hard crack of shattering porcelain and tearing threads ripped through the air as Hidan's oversized weaspon embedded itself into Kakuzu's chest, sending sparks and plumes of smoke everywhere. Stunned, Hidan desperately tried to yank the curved blade free, but Inoichi took advantage of their shock to control Hidan into slashing at his partner in crime a second time.

Kakuzu's neck opened up straight to the bone –

And he remained standing.

 _What the fuck –_

Kakuzu's shredded cloak fluttered to the ground around him, and what Inoichi saw made him want to throw up.

Four grotesque, white faces were protruding from his back, one of them cracked and destroyed due to his manipulation of Hidan's nerves. And the man was covered from head to toe in stitches, like a rag doll but even more hideous. Kakuzu's threads opened up and unraveled, and then, his partly-severed head began _sewing itself_ back together.

"They don't call us the fucking Zombie Combo for nothing," Hidan smirked.

"Shut the hell up, would you?" Kakuzu growled, and then the remaining three faces fucking _burst from his body_ , dragging their emaciated, black, ribbonlike bodies with them. Within seconds, the tables had turned on Inoichi, and now he was being forced on the defensive.

 _Just who the heck were these guys?_ Inoichi cursed under his breath as he was forced to release his technique to dodge the column of fire that was bearing down upon him. His flak jacket took the brunt of the damage from the barrage of wind that followed, but he still sustained a good amount of scratches and bruises.

He tried to hit Kakuzu with his Mind Body Disturbance, to attack Hidan with, but it did him little good, for the strange white faces were not connected to his nerves. They would have to destroy all of those flying things somehow, to even have a chance of getting at the real guy.

 _If that's what it takes, then I'll do what I must._

Inoichi stood up, wiped the blood off his cheek, and drew a kunai. Whatever that drawing on the ground was meant to do, Inoichi knew that letting Hidan finish it up could only mean bad news for him. Naturally, his reaction to that was to disrupt his miniature art session. Quite funnily enough, mind control and muscle paralysis did some nasty things to one's artistic ability.

The amount of swearing resulting from that one move told Inoichi he was on the right track.

But his cheek wouldn't stop bleeding, and Inoichi could only maintain his Mind-Body Disruption for so long. He could feel his chakra draining. The ANBU team that remained with him – chosen specifically for their fuinjutsu and combat ability in the event that Gaara for some reason broke during transit – couldn't seem to make a dent in him. Any wound they gave him, save for dismemberment, only served to excite him more…and not in the regular way people were normally excited.

"Awww, _yesss_ , that feels _goood –_ now _that's_ what I call a massage worthy of Jashin-sama!"

There was definitely something wrong with him.

"You know, I might just let you live a little longer for that. It'll be more painful, but hey, that's a good thing, right?"

Suddenly, Inoichi saw it. An opening. The Mind-Body Disruption had messed up his nerves enough for him to leave his neck exposed. If they could chop off his head, and prevented him from reattaching it, then they could win this _–_

* * *

 _Konoha Border Patrol_

They were out doing a crappy C-rank for payday (boring, but today Sasuke was too tired for a real mission, and payday had to come from _somewhere_ ) when Hinata suddenly stopped and gasped. "One of our teams is being attacked."

"By what?"

"S-rank nin. We're the closest team available. The next closest team is also in this area, but they're another half an hour away." She deactivated her Byakugan. "Asuma-sensei, do you think we can take them?"

Of course they fucking couldn't. Asuma-sensei had _just_ been given his final medical clearance from the last time he fought Kisame Hoshigaki and The Royal Fucking Asstwat. Sasuke frowned and straightened his hitai-ate. "Even if we can't, it's our duty to slow them down while more reinforcements arrive."

"They're Akatsuki, though."

"Hmmm, no doubt."

"Ino's father was among the people being attacked."

"Then there isn't any time to lose."

"Sasuke, they were wearing the same cloaks your _brother_ was wearing when he invaded during the Chunin exams."

"My brother," Sasuke growled, "can go fuck himself up the arse with an untrimmed rose bush."

"All right," Hinata said. "Just making sure you won't do something stupid like, I don't know, run off and try to take him yourself if we do run into him."

"If we _do_ run into him, I have three grenades' worth of tear gas in my left pocket and five flashbangs in my right. Ever since Sakura screwed over your emo cousin with that trick – "

Choji coughed something that sounded suspiciously like "pot and kettle."

" – shut up, Choji – I'm not taking any chances."

"Those don't look like the standard-issue bombs," Asuma frowned.

"Of course they aren't. I stole them from Jiraiya, who confiscated them from Naruto. Which automatically means they're ten times worse and probably laced with extra-strength itching powder and concentrated sriracha for good measure."

Even as they laughed, however, Sasuke's hands were shaking uncontrollably. In the shadows of the burning forest, he could make out a few odd, flat, white disks with limbs attached. As one of them turned to face him, he saw a vague face-like shape etched onto it. The painted mouth opened. Blades of wind poured out of it in torrents, ripping axe-sized scars into the rocks and wood.

"What in the name of the Rikudo's shriveled ballsack is that goddamn thing – "

He never got to finish his sentence. There was a faint _whoosh_ of air, and Sasuke dropped to the ground, his clipped black hairs flying all over the place. Good thing it was spiked up a lot higher than his neck, otherwise his smile would be –

Several branches before them splintered like bullet-riddled windows. Hinata tackled him to the ground, just in time to dodge the windmill of woodchips flying through the air.

Another gust of air. Choji and Hinata landed on the ground beside him. Sasuke tasted the smell of _burning_.

Iron. Blood. But not his own. There was something wrong. Cooking meat. Definitely cooking meat. No, charring meat. There was something wrong. It was not the meaty smell of Choji's mother's barbecue, nowhere near as pleasant. There was something wrong. Choji's mother's roast pork smelled wonderful and inviting, spicy and savory in all the right ways. This was meat, definitely meat, but it was acrid, moist, earthy, like burning rubber, no not rubber, it was thinner, sharper, leaner, angrier, more painful, the smell of suffering. There was something wrong –

"Fuck!" he screamed. " _FUCK! Hinata!_ "

Choji grabbed as much dirt as he could in his enormous hands and dumped it on top of the flames shooting up from Hinata's jacket. The thing was meant to be mostly fireproof, but the fire coming from the mask-things had been too hot, and it had melted straight through the fabric into her back.

"Medic down! _Medic down!_ " Sasuke yelled, over the sound of Hinata's screams. Even as her face turned red and her throat went hoarse and her skin charred and her own body stole away her reserves of healing chakra, however, she continued to insist that she was fine. "Crap, that'll scar really badly…"

"Scarring doesn't matter," Choji snarled. "She needs to live first."

And then he ripped a fucking tree straight out of the ground, roots and all.

It was at times like this that Sasuke was brutally reminded of why the Akimichi were considered one of the Four Noble Clans alongside the Uchiha and Hyuga – and not just because they were a large family (no pun intended). His true fighting ability rarely manifested itself beyond the gentle nature he normally displayed, but every time it did…

To taunt a giant was a dangerous thing.

Despite his size, he was fast. Ridiculously so. As in, even the flying masks had a hard time shooting at a target that big. His fists came down, leaving a crater in the earth – Sasuke squinted through the smoke, and could just barely make out the target with his Sharingan – black cloak, red clouds.

It wasn't Itachi, though. The figure was too big and bulky for that. And, also, too slow. At least, compared to Itachi. By himself, he was plenty fast. Enormous, bloodied knuckes fell upon him time and time again, and yet he kept standing back up. _Insane healing factor. This is not good._

"I'm going on defense," Sasuke said. How he was going to deal with these things, he didn't know yet. His best style of ninjutsu was fire style, and obviously that was going to be useless in front of these things, which were doing all the burning in the first place. "Hinata, don't worry about us. Heal yourself first."

"I'm okay I'm okay I'm okay I'm okay I'm okay I'm okay I'm okay I swear I'm okay – "

"Yes you are, yes you are, you'll be fine, hang on – " That was a big fat lie, and as the words left his lips both of them knew it. Her skin was clammy, and her face had gone from red to grey. She was going into shock, and Sasuke didn't know any medical ninjutsu. She was the one person on their team who did. He'd have to do it the hard way – physically keep her warm and hope that her mind didn't shut down before her healing finished –

Where were all the ANBU? The report was that an ANBU team was in trouble. Where were they? Where were they? Where were they?

They were somewhere else. There was a second guy, and they were busy spending all of their sealing resources just trying to keep him contained. There weren't many left. Presumably, the rest had been killed by the flying masks before their team had interfered. Well, wasn't that reassuring.

"Stay with me, Hinata; you can do it," he whispered, because that was the only thing he _could_ do.

* * *

 **A/N: All of the fight scenes involving the Akatsuki are happening simultaneously. For example, Team 7 did not travel from Iron to Fire in between the time it took for Inoichi to meet the Akatsuki (last chapter) and start fighting them (this chapter). They started walking a few days before that, and Inoichi's section was a flashback/split-screen.**

 **Comments and questions welcome.**


	53. Slash and Burn Deforestation

**A/N: Once again, everything is happening simultaneously. There are some segments that are positioned later in the chapter, but did not necessarily happen after (timing-wise) the segments that came before them.**

* * *

 _Fire Country_

"Inoichi's in trouble," Gaara argued. "Why aren't we helping him?"

"The rest of my team is there," said the one ANBU left to drag him along. "The mission was to move you to Konoha, and I'm the fastest runner as well as the weakest fighter."

Gaara bit back tears. If any of them got hurt, it would be all his fault. They were doing it to protect him. Inoichi was in danger for _his_ sake. Having his life threatened was nothing new; the gods knew Gaara had fended off one too many assassination attempts in his childhood. But the idea of having someone defend him while his life was being threatened was new to him. As far as he was concerned, he had always been on his own, just himself and his sand.

 _Baki wouldn't have done this for me,_ he thought morosely. _Baki gave me away. Inoichi could have just told them to take me and leave him alone, but he didn't. Why does Inoichi have to be the one to get hurt, when he was the one doing the nice things for me?_

"Will Inoichi be okay?" Ever since the demon in his head stopped talking, Inoichi was one of his few friends, one of the few people who would still talk to him and treat him like something other than a monster to either fear or kill. Him, and Ibiki, and a few others, but Inoichi was the first and his favorite –

All of a sudden, the tree branch in front of him cracked open in a flare of fire. Both of them were flung outwards, in opposite directions. His eardrums collapsed under the enormous pressure caused by the sudden heated air. Instinctively, the dirt and sand coiled up around him in a protective shell – but the shell burst in a shower of soil and stone when a sharp gust of wind joined the fireball.

Above them, what seemed to be ghostly masks were floating around, smoke and flame pouring from their open mouths. Another explosion rocked the tree they were standing on, blasting them off their feet and sending them flying to the ground. Gaara landed hard on his shoulder and rolled three times before he skidded to a stop against a tree trunk.

He could barely move; there were so many _plants_ in Fire Country, roots and giant trees and vines everywhere, tripping him and bursting into flame whenever one of the flying ghost masks hit it. Thick water was in his eyes. It tasted salty. He hoped they were just tears.

The whole forest around them was lighting up. Gaara tried to beat it down with his sand, but it wasn't good enough. They'd all cook alive at this rate, if the smoke didn't suffocate them first.

All those beautiful trees, going up in smoke. Gaara knew they'd grow back, but it hurt to watch them die all the same; he had come from a land where even the tiniest bit of green was cherished, and to see them go to brown and black so quickly – this forest was generations in the making and now it was burning to the ground before his eyes…how long did it take for this place to grow, and how quickly was it destroyed? All that hard work, gone.

His ANBU guard had disappeared.

There was nowhere to hide, and nowhere to run, not that he could possibly leave while Inoichi was still out there somewhere.

Gaara gathered up his sand and ran back.

* * *

 _The Road from Suna_

They hadn't wasted any time. Sunagakure would always be there, but this particular attack was not one they could leave alone. Inoichi Yamanaka was transporting a prisoner of very high priority – as in, the same type of priority that lived under the seal on Naruto's stomach – and if they failed in that mission the consequences would be severe.

He technically wasn't supposed to have access to any of this information, but thanks to a childhood well-spent poking his nose into places that were frankly none of his business, the Sandaime had given up on keeping him out of classified intel a long time ago. He was a ninja, after all, and any lock he could pick was fair game.

Ino had told him that she didn't think he was bad-tempered or selfish. Trouble was, the part about him being bad-tempered and selfish was also false; he hadn't changed his nature since he was small. Just his values, just his ability to pretend. Whatever selfless acts he performed all had a basis in selfishness.

 _Naruto. Shikamaru. Ino. Truly, you've become brave young men and women in your own right._ They were so strong, so intelligent. _Gods, please don't take them from me. Please, don't, just don't. Not for my sake – I know I deserve whatever bad luck I get thrown at me − but for theirs._

 _Please, gods, anyone but them. Anyone but them._

Half of him was torn in going full hypocrite and taking his kids home instead of helping Ino's father, because Naruto, too, carried a bijuu, and they'd be putting themselves in double jeopardy if both of Konoha's jinchuuriki were in the same place. The other half of him knew that if Ino's father got hurt because he forced them to turn their backs and do nothing, his team would never forgive him, and he would never forgive himself.

Besides, Naruto was team leader, and when he made the order to divert from their current mission to assist another Konoha team, Ino and Shikamaru hadn't hesitated in agreeing. If he attempted to override that order now, there would definitely be mutiny.

 _"Fine, Bakashi. If you're not going to go help, then I will!"_

Obito's ghost suddenly had blonde hair and blue eyes, and instead of a boulder it was an empty husk of a corpse with the tailed beast forcibly extracted from it, and so many ghosts were floating by him, whispering accusingly in his ear, _(this wouldn't have happened if you had just gone in the first place,_ and _you really haven't changed, Bakashi, not one bit, still as cold-hearted as ever I see)_.

 _Fine, I'll do it, I'll go,_ Kakashi snapped at the floating ghosts. _Just shut up already −_

Then one of them opened its mouth and spat fire at him.

Fuck, never mind, those weren't ghosts; those things were real, and they were getting closer, and shit fuck dammit in a tissue box.

(Hey, what happened in ANBU stayed in ANBU.)

"Kakashi-sensei," Naruto whispered, "if you wouldn't mind, please watch our backs."

As he watched them zip through the forest straight towards the danger, he thought that perhaps they would be okay.

"Of course I will," he replied automatically, unfurling his scroll of Hiraishin seals. "It's what I've always done."

* * *

 _Fire Country_

All the clones Naruto had sent out to look for Ino's father kept popping, and none of the memories they gave back to him made any sense. They kept getting killed by – trees? Nothing else was visible; the smoke was too thick and the fire too strong. Meanwhile, Kakashi-sensei had disappeared, and none of them knew where he was.

Not that he would have been helpful even if he was here. For the past several months, Ino's father kept having to go on missions outside Konoha (the very mission he was supposed to come home from today), and so he'd missed the first round of general Hiraishin-tag handouts that had happened during their post-Wave training break.

Naruto looked around for Hinata, wanting to ask her about Ino's father, hoping that she knew more than Team 7 did, only to immediately dismiss that question when he saw the state she was in. There was an enormous hole all over the back of her coat, and Naruto could see faint smudges of black and purple in her red blistering back.

"We last saw Ino's father about few kilometers that way," Choji said. "There were two guys, but when they heard us coming they split up. If we even want a chance of getting at the other guy, we'll have to beat this one first."

Naruto wanted to say something. To let them know that allies were here. That they would help. Sasuke had the look of someone who had watched too many people die, and Choji had the look of someone who was done with people dying.

"What are you going to do, pelt mud and sticks?" Sasuke asked his clones dubiously, though it was clear he was joking, doing his best to make light of a decidedly not funny situation.

Naruto shrugged. "If enough of them do it, sooner or later, something's going to get clogged. _We have more bodies than you have kunai, so welcome to Konoha, bitches,_ and all that crap."

Sasuke barked out a chuckle. "Can't believe you remember that one; that was from way back in the Academy. Weren't you ditching for most of those days?"

"Yeah, well, Ino and Shikamaru didn't, so same difference really − "

But he was interrupted when a whoosh of air passed over his head. A flash of heat. Without even having to stop and think, he dropped flat to the ground and covered his face and ears with his hands. Rubble and splinters pierced his cheek. A fireball collided against Shikamaru's shoddily erected earth wall, and the temperature of the stone immediately spiked up to _burning_.

His lungs and throat were sandpaper. He crawled across the dirt, half-blinded by smoke. His jacket ripped open, leaving the mesh armor underneath to cut bloody criss-crosses into his side. All of them were gasping for their lives.

Fingers. Naruto's fingers came together, flying through the hand seals, trained by heart to my muscle memory. His hair flared outwards in a mess of fiery spikes. They struck the Water mask, hitting it in the holes where its eyes, nose, and mouth were supposed to be. He hadn't expected it to work as well as it did, because those things clearly didn't have to see or breathe in the same way humans did. But he saw the mask cough and choke, and he figured, he wouldn't complain about anything as long as it worked. Naruto had bought them some time, the extra few milliseconds they needed.

 _FWIP_

Like clockwork, or perhaps, perfect teamwork, a giant glob of dirt shot out from underneath Shikamaru's feet, and hit the still wobbling Water mask right in the mouth.

 _SLAP_

It pivoted around its neck, a full 360 in midair. The attack went wide, causing loads of water, streaked with bits of mud, to spray everywhere, but there was no force behind it; without any concentration it had barely the effect of a garden sprinkler. The mask and its attached body slammed into the ground, and hacked up a bit, wet, black hairball of grime.

 _Naruto!_ Shikamaru yelled over their mental connection. _Move exactly six meters to his left!_

The glob of phlegm dropped to the ground, bounced a few times, and rolled down the hills, out of sight, where it met its end in a messy splatter soon after. When it managed to steady itself, it was staring straight at Shikamaru, positively infuriated.

Naruto's stomach dropped when his brain noticed the position his teammate was in. Shikamaru was prepared to jump away from the first blast from the Water mask, but not the next one, which took out at least three trees. The one after that almost hit him; he barely managed to jump out of the way in time, and it sent him sprawling to the ground. The fourth one would have definitely killed him.

Luckily, at that moment, Naruto had finished moving six meters to his left, and, the Fire mask, too busy chasing him, got in the way instead.

It sputtered, doused – opened its mouth in rage – but too late, an enormous meaty fist wrapped around it first. Face purple, eyes red, Choji's fingers tightened and _squeezed_ , and the Fire mask, still too soaked to fight back, screamed, screamed, _kept on screaming_ , loud enough to rivala frog with a punctured lung. Then the Wind mask swooped in. Pressurized air sprayed from it like a steelcutter's jet saw, the force so concentrated that thick deep gashes opened up in Choji's palms. Both Choji and the Fire mask in his headlock were knocked off-balance and slammed into the ground right by his feet.

Big mistake on Kakuzu's part. One of Naruto's clones was there, waiting. He slapped one of Shikamaru's amplifier seals on top of a bundle of his customized explosive tags and shoved the entire bomb elbow-deep into the mask's mouth. As it choked, Ino yanked the elastic detonator string back as hard as she could and let the ring snap back upon its chipped painted nose.

It exploded in a million shards of porcelain and pepper-powdered fireworks, cutting through the air with edges as sharp as glass. The resulting recoil from the blowout cracked the other two masks and demolished at least three more trees. Threads flew everywhere. Bits of leathery flesh clung to the unraveled knots, a living voodoo doll, wrapping around all of their ankles.

Asuma-sensei was lifted off the ground by the neck and sent flying like he was a rag doll. Naruto shouted, and about a dozen hastily summoned clones popped into existence, cushioning Asuma-sensei's landing with their pile of bodies.

As the dust cleared, he could see the shadowy outline of an enormous man, all muscle and sinew and stitches; it was a giant walking voodoo doll, straight out of a science fiction horror. His voice was deep, menacing, all dissonant chords and infrasound.

"I will _rip you open_ ," Kakuzu growled. "I will _snap your ribs off_ , piece by _piece_ , and drag your heart from your chest so hard your lungs will become your _wings_ , and I will make you watch as I do the same to _each_ and _every_ one of your little friends, too."

A cruel smirk opened up his face from ear to ear like a Kirigakure necktie.

He grabbed Choji's swinging tree trunk by the branches and ripped it in half lengthwise.

"The fuck," Sasuke breathed.

Naruto wholeheartedly agreed with that sentiment. But if Kakuzu had been expecting fear from them, he would be in a world of disappointment. Naruto could only roll his eyes in disgust. Of all the people his threads were currently making _physical contact_ with, one of them was a _Nara_.

 _Dumbass._

Shikamaru's shadow immediately snaked outwards, following the trail down to its source. Within less than a second he had control. Palms slammed into the ground, and a pit of rock spikes opened up before Kakuzu; his body, still under the control of the Shadow Bind, flopped forward.

His chest alone was pierced in fourteen different places.

 _Drip._

 _Drip._

"N-n-n-n-n-n-"

 _Drip._

Unintelligible moans, punctured with howls of agony, tore through the air. While Shikamaru had turned the human-voodoo-threads wrapped around him into shadow conduits, Ino had turned hers into live wires, delivering shock upon shock of electricity straight to his muscles. As each twitch impaled Kakuzu deeper on the earth pikes, Choji shouldered the tree trunk that he'd ripped in half earlier and started beating him with it.

Sasuke was tossing a pink grenade up and down in the air.

"The pink ones were for Academy pranks," Naruto told him.

"Okay."

"They're filled with glue and glitter."

"To a guy with gaping stab wounds, it's corrosive flesh adhesive and artery-sized shrapnel."

Naruto stared at Sasuke, then at Kakuzu, then at Sasuke, then at Hinata, then back to Kakuzu.

He shrugged and stepped back.

"Do whatever you want."

As Sasuke rolled the bombs into the pit, Naruto's eyes met Kakuzu's for one last time. They were pupil-less with a pretty green colour, the same as Ino's, but they did not shine with her love and life and laughter; they were fringed in red, cold and robotic and devoid of any trace of empathy.

"Kids like you…" he coughed, piercing Naruto with a glare of absolute hatred. "should go burn in hell."

Naruto scanned the clearing skeptically.

The fires still raged around them. The fires _Kakuzu_ set.

"Hell? _Hell?_ "Naruto laughed, harder than he'd ever laughed before. "If you're talking about the hell that _you_ brought upon yourself, I think we're already here."

* * *

Two masks left.

To her relief, Ino saw the Wind mask disappear back into Kakuzu's chest. Of course, this extra life he'd taken into himself wasn't helping his situation at all. He was still stuck in the pit, and all he was doing was making himself die more slowly.

One mask left.

She prepared to stab Kakuzu one last time, to finish off the Water mask once and for all, but Naruto stopped her. "There's still fires everywhere. If we let the Water mask chase around some of my clones, we can put them out faster, and find your father more easily."

Ino nodded, but inside her head, even though it had only been maybe a few minutes since they had arrived, she was thinking, _Not good enough. We're still too slow._ Her father's team had moved outside her mental contact range about ten minutes ago.

Was she being selfish? Maybe. She glared down at what remained of Kakuzu. _Why couldn't they just die already?_ Her father was so close, and yet so far, just a few meters away in a separate clearing in the forest, and yet she couldn't leave to go find him because she was tied down here.

Fighting ugly, weird, ninjutsu parodies of the No-Face ghost from that one movie.

It terrified her, how callously she was thinking about this man – could they even call him a proper man; he shouldn't even be _alive_ – and how easy was it, to dismiss his life as an abomination of nature, to dehumanize him until she could convince herself, all too easily, that it was okay to kill him and that his life didn't matter and that they should just do it and end him already now right away five minutes ago?

But after she had that thought, she remembered all those times her father had helped teach her jutsu, and carried her on his shoulders, and bought her clothes and toys and treats and paint for her room, and she –

To hell with her abstract morals; her father mattered more, and she wasn't about to waste her time getting hung up over some bastard who was no better than she was.

These men were trying to kill them, after all. In scuffles of this nature there were bound to be casualties. They hardly mattered in the grand scheme of things. She was only looking out for her friends here. Was it really a crime to want to survive? From the monsters in Wave Country, to these guys here.

Just how many of these attacks were related? Were they all a result of the same thing? Apart from their team, of course; they seemed to be the greatest common denominator in every single incident. So many enemies. Like in the comics, good guys against the bad guys, but the bad guys were everywhere _and what does it say about you, you, the supposed "good guy" of your own life, when everyone you see is a bad guy, when everyone is your enemy, making you everyone's enemy in turn?_

She narrowed her eyes. _Live or die,_ she thought, _it's all the same._ They were all shinobi here. Kakuzu knew what he was getting into when became a shinobi, when he decided to go rogue. She wasn't going to waste any more of her energy trying to empathize with him. She only wanted her father back. All she could hope for at this point was for one of Naruto's clones to run into something.

Or…

"Where's Kakashi-sensei?"

Almost as soon as she asked that question, her mind suddenly overloaded with random blurry pictures, white trees against black smoke. Her head spun as his rapidly flickering field of vision skittered through her mind. The world flipped around, back and forth, up and down. She was watching a badly done 3D movie, with the colors inverted. She was standing on a badly tied tightrope, swaying on unstable ground, flying through the air like a cork floating aimlessly on the sea, not knowing if she was ever going to land.

Nauseated, she quickly pulled back and braced her hands on her knees. _That is,_ she chastised herself, _the last time I ever try to maintain a mental connection with someone high on the Hiraishin no Jutsu._

Ino knew Shikamaru was never so disorganized. Even Naruto, at his core, always knew exactly what he was doing, and who he was. Was this how teleportation felt, the strain dimension jumps took on the mind? Or was this how her teacher always was?

Her knees wobbled. She wanted to sink down into the dirt.

No, no she couldn't. They needed to end this, and quickly. Her father was out there. Somewhere. Ino tried her best to ignore the debris littering the forest floor. Once, she had been so hesitant to kill, and now, it seemed almost too easy.

Worryingly so.

"Ino? What's wrong? What's holding up Kakashi-sensei?" Shikamaru asked.

She shook her head. "We're not done. There's another one. Apart from…Kakuzu and Hidan."

"Another one apart from…what? Who – "

Ino pointed, and, as the last of the forest fires receded, they finally saw what was hiding behind the wall of smoke. "While we were fighting Kakuzu, he's been keeping all of those things away from us, all on his own."

They were everywhere, a veritable army of them.

The white trees.

White trees with yellow faces and the teeth of carnivores.

Zetsu.

Ino threw her senses out as far as they could go. _Where's my father?_ she begged, hoping to pick up even a little trace of his thoughts. _Where is he?_

She found nothing.

* * *

 _Fire Country_

Hope blossomed in Inoichi's chest. _Allies have arrived; I can feel it._

Two teams. That was two teams more than he had expected to respond to his call for help. One of them came from a scheduled patrol. They were maybe five minutes away. The other was a team returning home from a mission earlier than expected. If they ran as fast as they could, they would make it in about ten minutes. He wondered who they were; his brain was too preoccupied to identify anything more concrete than basic distance evaluations.

Inoichi, in full control of Hidan's mind, swung the man's scythe at his own neck.

Or at least, he tried to.

One moment, he could feel the connection, and the next −

Nothing.

Inoichi felt like he was floating for a second, before everything crashed to the ground. He felt dead. No energy left. _Have I really been using that much chakra – no way, I timed it –_

There, on his back. He saw – a strange patch of white. A yellow smiling face. And he could sense the chakra. Moving.

That – thing – was – stealing – his –

"Dammit, Zetsu!" Hidan yelled. "Stop ruining my goddamn fun!"

Inoichi turned his head, and came face-to-face with a strange, tall, plantlike creature. With horror, he realized –

 _Hidan and Kakuzu were not the only Akatsuki members waiting for us today._

"I wouldn't have to, if you had killed him properly right away. He already tricked you into destroying one of Kakuzu's hearts with his mind technique."

"Stop bossing me around! You're not my mother! I killed my mother!"

This guy. This was an S-rank nin. It was ridiculous. He was acting like a child. No, even better – he was acting like one of those old-time, over-the-top villains from all his favorite manga when he was in the Academy. Inoichi tasted iron on his lips, and chuckled, before he collapsed, ears ringing. His head spun. Nausea, too much of it, he could not balance.

A loud bang came from above. Blasting noises, everywhere. Inoichi touched his ears, and felt liquid. His eyes stung. He pushed himself to his feet. Except he didn't. He couldn't move. He had no energy. He was starving.

The spores were sucking him dry.

The dust cleared; Inoichi could see Hidan standing in a completed circumscribed triangle. His face had changed; it was no longer human, but skeletal, all black and white and deathly.

 _Someone destroy that circle,_ Inoichi begged. _Destroy the circle –_

The remaining ANBU immediately threw themselves at Hidan; one kicking dust over the drawing on the ground, the other two trying to push him down before he could stab himself any more, but whatever he had thrown at them, was not letting them balance properly. And so they wobbled, strangely, too strong to stay down but too weak to finish him off. He saw the white spores blossoming on their backs, too, and they all fell to the ground, first twitching, and then completely still.

Inoichi wondered, helplessly, where Gaara was. If Gaara's sand would protect him from the spores. If – if –

There was a searing pain in his abdomen. And then −

* * *

BONUS #41

 _Anatomy of a Fight Scene_

fanfiction [dotnet] /topic/185326/164154784/1/Bonus-41-Anatomy-of-a-Fight-Scene


	54. So Soars the Firefly

_Lightning Country_

He was pretending to be a Nara tonight, for the shadows were his friends. The shadows had been his friend for a very long time now – perhaps his only friend; Itachi wasn't going to be stupid enough to consider anyone in the Akatsuki trustworthy enough for any of that. Yugito Nii was a dangerous individual, famous among her peers from Kumogakure for a reason; the best way they could think of to minimize losses would be through stealth.

Now, why the hell Pein had chosen _Deidara_ to go on this mission with them even after knowing that fact was a mystery to Itachi, but if this failed then he wasn't complaining. As long as he didn't die before his time as a result. The state of his lungs was limited as it was. Chakra could only sustain him for so long. It had kept back the worst of the symptoms for most of his life, while he was growing up and training, but it wouldn't any longer. Every time he coughed, he could feel more and more mucus gathering in his air passageways.

Perhaps Pein was sending them on this mission out of sheer impatience. It would certainly explain why they had suddenly changed the plan – trying to pin the disappearance of a Kumo nin on Konoha, rather than the other way around, even though having Kumogakure be the guilty party in this one made more sense –

– _BADOOM!_

"What the heck?" Kisame hissed.

" _Deidara_ ," Itachi groaned under his breath.

Kisame sighed exasperatedly. "That idiot."

 _Why_ had they brought him, again?

Oh, right. Because apparently, this mission required four people rather than the usual team of two, on the account that Yugito Nii would be better guarded and better trained than the other jinchuuriki, who had been rogue or traveling alone. Also, because some genius had managed to convince Pein that Deidara and Sasori were a better choice than Hidan and Kakuzu.

Itachi gave himself an invisible pat on the back.

"Should we get out of here?" Itachi asked drily.

"There will be trouble if we fail," Kisame said. "Pein won't be pleased if we don't return with at least _something_."

Itachi nodded mutely, and signaled for Kisame to follow him in a wide circle around the area where Sasori and Deidara had intially engaged Yugito Nii. The initial plan had been for Itachi to distract everyone with a mass area effect genjutsu first, and _then_ use force in the likely case their targets managed to notice and dispel the illusion in time. Naturally, Deidara had decided that plans weren't his thing, and that rushing in and bombing everyone like their land was full of black gold was his preferred mode of operation.

That wasn't Itachi's problem.

The terrain was rough, and all the smoke made it difficult for even the Sharingan to see through, but from what Itachi could tell, a few explosions hadn't hurt Yugito Nii much. If anything, they had only made her even more irritated. Both her hands glowed with bright blue chakra, shaped into claws; one swipe from her could easily disembowel an elephant. True, Deidara was too far away for her to reach, having realized that climbing onto one of his birds and flying far far away was the smartest thing to do right about now, but that didn't mean he was in any less danger.

She spat fire.

Deidara might have _used_ explosives, but he was just as immune to their effects as any other man. That is to say, not very.

One jet from her killed his giant clay bird and burned off one of his arms. She could not do any more to hurt him, for at that moment, Sasori had killed the last of her comrades and was now turning his puppets on her, but that did little to help Deidara, who was falling hundreds of feet from the sky.

There were cracks in the rock radiating from where he had hit the ground.

"Go help Sasori, Kisame. I'll take care of Deidara," Itachi ordered, watching Yugito Nii demolish yet another one of Sasori's puppets. Another mouse-shaped fireball burned through the strings of five more, and Sasori, normally silent, cursed loudly.

Kisame nodded, and drew Samehada. For good measure, Itachi cast a quick genjutsu, to "help" out Sasori just a tad, and then snuck his way over to the clump of shrubbery where Deidara had fallen. He was injured, but not dead; the bushes had broken his fall, and he had spat out enough clay at the last second to shield his neck and head from the worst of the damage.

"Uggghh…" he groaned, crawling out of the wreckage. Itachi grabbed him by the shoulders and pulled him out of the pile of ash and earth when the sky lit up yet again –

He saw Yugito Nii's stray fireball coming, and jumped out of the way.

Deidara, still disoriented from his fall, didn't.

His life ended there.

A bit depressing, that he had just barely escaped one death, only to walk into an other one.

As Itachi observed the smouldering pile of smoke that had once been Deidara hiss and deflate, he wondered if he should feel even the slightest bit of guilt for abandoning a fellow Akatsuki member to his death. And then he decided, no. He didn't feel guilty for leaving Deidara to die. It was his own fault; if he had just followed the plan like he was supposed to, he wouldn't have died. Then again, it had been Itachi who had suggested the quietest, most boring plan he could think of, knowing that Deidara would disagree.

There was silence coming from the other side of the bushes. The fight was over; Samehada, his illusions, and the puppets combined had taken their toll on Yugito Nii. There work was done here. Now Sasori and Kisame were fast approaching. Hastily, Itachi shoved Deidara's chunk of clay underneath some bushes and stepped out to greet them.

"That looks nasty," Kisame whistled. He nudged Deidara's blackened body with a toe. "Maybe we should have brought Hidan and Kakuzu here after all. At least they wouldn't have died."

Sasori shrugged. "I hated him anyway."

"No matter," Itachi said, producing some pre-made evidence bags. "We should clean up. The boss said we have to make it look like Konoha was responsible."

Kisame willingly reholstered Samehada and took a bag, while Sasori grimaced, but dragged his puppets along anyway. Throughout the process, Itachi made sure to forget about one of Deidara's lumps of clay. There was a Kumo team nearby, though he couldn't make out more than the apparent leader, a woman with short blonde hair. If she was even a halfway decent Jonin, she would find it –

"Oy, Itachi, you missed this," Kisame said.

 _Damn. Never mind, then._ "Apologies," Itachi mumbled.

"Hey, Itachi, you sure you're doing okay? It's not like you to make these little mistakes." If Itachi didn't know better, he might have mistaken that for concern in Kisame's voice. "How bad has your vision really deteriorated? Be honest."

"…Maybe a year before I go fully blind."

"Wow. Um. How fuzzy is it right now?" Kisame waved his hand in front of his face. "You think prescriptions would help? Unless you're afraid of looking ridiculous."

"Given my associates, I think that would help me fit in more, actually." Kisame punched him in the arm. It was as close to brotherly as they would ever get.

* * *

 _Fire Country_

Desperation fogged all of her thoughts. Ino watched as Kakashi-sensei completely tore through the White Zetsu creatures like paper. With every kick, another one of their plants died, their earthy bodies burnt through, a tree struck by lightning. The clearing was littered with firebombs and chakra wires filled with current.

He was flying. Every explosion of electricity would bump him up into the air, and then he would disappear off to another Hiraishin seal marker, toes never brushing the ground, not even once. And while he could catch them, they could not catch him, no matter what they tried, whether it was growing out their arms and legs in twisted vines or joining their pasty white bodies into giant Venus flytraps – he was untouchable, unstoppable, unbeatable.

She was watching a god of thunder and lightning, all bright sparks and light feet. The monsters could regenerate their depleted numbers, split in two to spawn another one of its ilk, but for every White Zetsu that was born, Kakashi-sensei would murder three with his bare feet, and his wire traps would burn up five more.

And yet.

And yet the dark monsters of fear and anxiety clawed at her mind. They ate away at her brain, her self-control, her common sense. The Hiraishin no Jutsu was fast, amazingly fast, ridiculously fast, _terrifyingly_ fast. More of the White Zetsu army were dying than being born. Eventually, the White Zetsu army would be whittled down to nothing −

But "eventually" wasn't good enough.

However fast Kakashi-sensei was going, it simply wasn't _fast_ enough.

 _I don't care. I don't care. I just want to find my father._ They _needed_ to go find her father –

"Can you guys take care of the Water mask?" she asked.

Sasuke shot another glance at Hinata. Her stability was improving, for now. But of course, Ino realized, he was reluctant to leave her alone. Not because he doubted the skill of Naruto's clones, but because, by principle, teammates didn't leave each other behind. Ino would have clung just as tightly, had it been someone from Team 7.

But needs must. Sasuke had been one of the best fighters in the Academy, and they needed everything they could get.

Naruto nodded. The burnt-out clearing filled with fifty more of him. "Of course we can, but what are you planning to do − "

 _Ushi, Oo, Hitsuji, Mee._

The sparks danced around her temples.

It was possible, she knew, to transfer lightning chakra across an insulated gap, if the gap was small enough and the electric power was high enough. It was also possible, she knew, to transfer lightning chakra over longer distances through direct contact, be it metal, string, or hair.

But transferring lightning chakra over longer distances across an insulated gap without assistance from a conductor had been impossible.

Up until now.

"What the heck – " she heard Shikamaru exclaim, and then the entire world was drowned out save for a soft humming in her ears.

The Yamanaka mental techniques, and really, any contactless or nonphysical techniques, were still also chakra constructs – wireless ones. Simply replacing the yin and yang chakra in the technique with elemental chakra, her lightning transformations, in the right amount –

Well, it was a bit like connecting a watermelon to a capacitor.

Three, two, one –

A fluorescent tunnel of glowing electromagnetic waves pulsed before her eyes. Her mind scattered into trillions of tiny charged particles. She was zipping through the air, puncturing through all the remaining White Zetsu clones; she was a bullet, an electron, a cannon, an atom, ripping them all apart at the structural level. Their cells popped before her face like soap bubbles, all the fibers and tissue shredding, ripping apart.

This was just her.

Just her, and her mind.

It was exhilarating, intoxicating, this _power_ , to be able to control, to be able to simply _think_ something and have it happen; she was a Yamanaka, and in their clan, the _intent_ to kill and the _act_ of killing were one and the same. She burned, hotter than a thousand splendid suns. Zetsu was strong and hardy against solid attacks, but earth was weak before lightning; they stood no chance. She may not be Kakashi-sensei, able to move her body quickly through physical space, but she could move her energy, and _that_ the woody creatures were powerless against.

And then, by pure chance, she hit one of the creatures by its toes, where its roots were.

 _Oh,_ she thought. _Oh ho ho. This is just too good._

The White Zetsu army, it seemed, also communicated telepathically. Thousands upon thousands of roots all running underneath the ground, each tree clone a node in their distributed information scheme. And, judging by the volume of random information bouncing around, it seemed like they were letting this thing running constantly. The sheer amount of power they required just to keep every single clone connected at once was absolutely massive.

It would be their downfall.

One network. _One_ bloated, insecure, obscurity-reliant network that _all_ of them were connected and forcibly contributing to.

 _And she had just gained direct access to it._

The soft electric hum in her ears doubled, tripled, quadrupled their frequency up to a maddening high-pitched whirr as she overloaded their root structure all the lightning she could muster. Given the capacity of power already naturally straining their system, it didn't take much.

Bark cracked angrily. Tree trunks spontaneously combusted. Twigs and leaves shriveled into thin air like they were stepped on by invisible men with bonfires for shoes. All their white, sticky, pasty wood burst into flame, fueled by their own internal sticky starch that made up most of the White Zetsu bodies, bright sparks fizzling out as quickly as they came, unable to withstand the force of her added current. The psychic pathways sawed through everything they touched, sharp like a web of garrotes.

Within the safe confines of her mind space, Ino let out a mad cackle.

She was unstoppable.

Before, she was simply destroying the ones in the direct range of her Mind Transfer, which wasn't very far – the Mind Transfer was very short-range, barely reaching anything that wasn't right in front of her face. But now, she could contact _every_ Zetsu out there, see everything _they_ were seeing, limited only by her own small chakra reserves. They might as well have let Shikamaru loose in their forest in the middle of the night –

 _NIGHT_

 _BLACK_

 **DARKNESS**

 _ **BLACK**_

 **"You do not belong here."**

"What – "

 _ **WHAM.**_

Suddenly her rocketing speed slammed into a halt. She crashed against a wall of ice. Sharp shards of freezing ink punctured her brain. In mere milliseconds she had plunged from the top of the world into a bottomless pit. She couldn't move; her brain was stuck in this tar, sticky and dense and too too cold and burning; she was swimming in a pool of liquid mercury with gold weights attached to her limbs and she couldn't see.

Snot dripped from her nose, but she didn't dare disrupt her chakra structures, so she resisted the urge to wipe it away.

Her tongue darted out. Wait, that wasn't snot.

Crap, nosebleed.

Her arms shook uncontrollably and her vision oscillated between too dark and too bright. Her face felt wet and too rough, her body shivering with blistering fever.

She didn't have much longer before she would start shutting down. Her brain pounded from the sheer exertion it took to keep herself conscious, which only made things worse as she expended more strength to make up for her draining weakness.

And there, a wave of nausea, crashing down upon her again, but she could not close the connection, as much as she wanted to.

 **"Arrogant little girl. You thought just because you defeated some White Zetsu clones, that you could wander into the realm of Black Zetsu, and walk away?"**

The cold fingers of the black shadow coiled around her neck. The noose tightened.

 **"No. It is not that easy."**

Panic descended.

 _Let go of me! Let go of me letgoofme letgoletgoletgo –_

Ino screamed.

* * *

One moment, we were launching the last of our explosives at the final mask of Kakuzu, and the next, Ino had been blown back fifty feet into a tree.

Faster than a blink of an eye, Kakashi-sensei's Hiraishin rampage died down into nothing, and then he was curled over her, looking simultaneously every bit too old and too young, weary yet vulnerable, feverishly, frantically, pouring what remained of his chakra into her ribcage, trying desperately to restart her heart.

 _"Ino, you're going to have to lie down – you completely messed up your own head with that technique, foolish girl – "_

Even from where I stood, I could see the electrical burns zigzagging across her palms and face.

"Oh gods," Naruto moaned in terror. "Ino – "

"You couldn't have known what she was planning," Choji said quickly. "You trusted her, and you can't blame yourself – "

"Fuck the blame game." I snarled, irrational fury tearing my brain apart. "What the fuck just happened?" I snarled. "What. _The fuck._ Just happened."

"Does it look like I know?!" Naruto spat. "Whatever technique she used fried all those White Zetsu things simultaneously, it must have backfired somehow – "

I shook my head. "Just looking at it, I can tell what she did. She took the Mind Transfer, replaced some of the normal chakra with lightning chakra, and let all the White Zetsu blow themselves up. That should _not_ have been enough to rebound against her. No. Wherever her mind went, she must have run into something else," I said darkly.

Fucking hell, though. Way to take down a regiment of cannibalistic plant-men. She had decimated their ranks in less than a second. And after all that she just dropped like a sack of potatoes? _Something_ must have happened −

Out of the corner of my eyes, I saw it.

A little oily puddle, dense and pitch-dark, and yet smoky and light, attached to the heels of the one White Zetsu still standing.

Just like a shadow.

Crawling…feeding off all the light and life energy in the area…sucking everything happy into its black hole of a stomach.

To this day, I have no idea what possessed me to do such a thing.

But I reached out and touched it.

Perhaps there was a power in it that I recognized as my own. Both of us were like shadows, in a way, and whatever we touched, we had a burning desire to take over and manipulate. A taste of my own medicine, so to speak, of all the times I had dared to use the Shadow Possession Jutsu on others…

As soon as my fingers – and shadow – made contact with this – this _thing_ – I immediately knew one thing.

I had just pulled the most monumentally imbecilic move of my entire life up until this point.

And that was saying something, because even though I knew I was smart I had done some magnificently stupid shit when I got into things way over my head. (There would be dumber things later on, but for now…this one took the cake.)

Again, I had – still have – no idea why I did it. This… _thing_ …I suppose the most apt name would be Black Zetsu, seeing as it was simply the inverted version of the White Zetsu trees…this Black Zetsu thing, somehow, affected me more than Ino's Mind Transfer ever had, affected me more than anyone else in the area.

And now I was stuck, trapped like an iron shaving on a magnet. I tried to get it off me. _Thump. Thump. Thumpthumpthumpthump –_ Blood pounded in my ears, as fast as a rabbit's heartbeat. _Rabbit rabbit rabbit –_ No such luck. It seemed completely resistant to anything any of us threw at it. Chakra, elemental techniques, weapons…all of them sunk into its great writhing mass.

 _Use your brain, damn you,_ I scolded myself. _There's got to be a way −_

An idea popped into my head. "Naruto, give me your chakra _now_! Please, I need it!"

Naruto was shaking. Somehow, I could tell he was the real one, not a clone. "How do I – "

"Feed your chakra into the – " I gestured at my own shadow with my chin, only to freeze as I saw the glowing blue and orange sputter and die.

Naruto glanced up at me, terrified. "It's not taking it! I don't – "

I let out a massive breath. "…Shit."

"What?"

I let the bomb drop. "Your chakra and my − shadows must also be…" _fuck_ "…incompatible."

Shit, shit, double shit. How could I have been stupid enough to forget? Our elemental natures, Wind and Earth, were neutral in comparison to each other, but the Shadow Bind, and all of its derivatives, including my shadow fuinjutsu, were all yin chakra types. Naruto's regular chakra, as well as the Kyuubi chakra, were disproportionately skewed towards yang chakra.

For what felt like hours, but was probably only about the span of five seconds, I had lost all of my ability to think. No, even worse – I _could_ think, but I could not control myself. I could only watch, a powerless audience member in my own life as my limbs were disconnected from my brain. It crawled over my head −

 **"It is a fact of life that death exists also,"** it said.

− and it wrapped itself around my face.

It was also at the very same moment that the fuse on the ball of detonators attached to Kakuzu's Water mask – delayed by the natural moisture surrounding its target − finished burning up.

One moment, the Water mask had been readying a attempt at one futile final attack. The next, it had exploded, and the volume of water it was carrying in its cheeks spilled uselessly to the ground.

Right on top of me.

So.

Picture me, fighting the Akatsuki, standing all glorious in their black cloaks and red clouds. Also picture me, lying on the ground, with this Black Zetsu thing wrapped around my nose and mouth like a dense cloth or a plastic bag. And also picture me, with water being poured on top of my head, over this cloth, which was covering my nose and mouth.

Looking back, it all sounds so stupid. So _damn stupid_. It was _just_ a _little bit_ of water and I was _fine_ and come _on_ it wasn't even that _bad_ it lasted barely a second _really so stupid_ I knew _onsen owners_ with stronger waterfalls than the comparative bucket that had fallen on me, the last choking bits of spittle of a dying mask, like come _on_ I thought I had overcome it, I thought it was already behind me, I really did – for fuck's sake, I _BEAT_ him, I _BEAT_ Itachi Uchiha at his own game, so why why _WHY_ was I _LOSING_ HERE?

(Because my brain, my damaged traumatized scarred _traitortraitorTRAITOR_ brain, with its perfect memory even in situations I would have rather forgotten, immediately assumed in a _brilliant_ leap of association – )

 _"It's nothing personal," Itachi Uchiha smiled down at me. "You remind me of myself, actually."_

 _The cloth went over my face. The bucket dangled in the air._

 _"Before everything went so. Horribly._ Wrong. _"_

* * *

The storm swirled around him. His mind, a complete haze. Gaara could hardly remember – the only thing he cared about now, was Inoichi's orders. _Kill them._ Kill all the Akatsuki. Gaara already knew too much about death; he would not let this man take away a person who had worked so hard to help him. His sand had shielded him from the worst of it, so he would have to be the one to do it.

There was so much dirt here. He was an entire ocean by himself. The sand went everywhere. Gaara didn't even bother to pay attention to his range. He could have flooded the whole forest for all he cared, _just as long as_ the Akatsuki were killed. And then he could rescue Inoichi and then Inoichi would take him home to Konoha where he would get to meet Inoichi's daughter and Inoichi's daughter's friend who was also his age and a jinchuuriki like him and then they could all live happily ever after and it would be wonderful −

Gaara stopped.

Inoichi was on the ground, arms wrapped around his own gut, mouth still open in a silent smile.

"Inoichi!"

It was useless.

"Inoichi, _please_ – "

His eyes were already blank.

"Inoichi, _Inoichi_ – Medic! I need a medic – someone – please – "

Too late for that.

"No, no, no, _no_ – "

His body had already been cold for the last fifteen minutes.

 _This is all your fault. You can never do anything right. You killed everyone you hated, Gaara, and now you can't keep the people you love alive, either –_

But no matter how much Gaara tried to call him, he would not respond, except for a smoky burble of blood from his mouth. Even in his death, everything that exited that man's lips had come straight from his heart.

 _So this is where your story ends, Inoichi Yamanaka._

Death made no bargains. Nor would denial or grief settle the score. Thus it followed that there would only be one option left.

So Gaara saw rage.

* * *

 **A/N:** **I'm going to the hardware store to buy barricades for my doors and windows. How many do you think I should get?**


	55. Guardian of Hell

_Fire Country_

The red haze slowly receded from her vision. Hinata's back felt rough and tarry, like a ring of tree bark in a drought. It was likely that she would need surgery after this. Her healing had saved her before her nerves could totally be destroyed; those surface ones, at least, might still grow back. But it had come at a cost. She was running on maybe a quarter of her chakra at best, and couldn't use any more on herself despite the shaky feeling in her knees, because who knew when someone else would need her help?

Shakily, she got to her feet, and activated her Byakugan, scanning the scene before her. Naruto – _when did Team 7 get here?_ – was as pale as a ghost, Ino was − _oh no oh no please don't let her be dead oh thank goodness she's barely breathing_ – Shikamaru was on the ground _completely gone nuts about something_ –

And they still had no idea where the team that had called for their help were.

"What's going on?" Hinata whispered. The inside of her throat felt like sandpaper. She needed water, but –

"This, _bitch_."

The burnt scabs on her back threatened to crack open as she was forcefully yanked upright. Cold metal pressed against her cheek.

 _Oh._

Now was definitely not a good time.

"Let her go!" Sasuke hissed angrily.

"Uh-uh-uh," Hidan whispered. "I think I would rather like seeing you guys in pain."

The severed head of an ANBU dropped by her feet. Though they were lucky enough to have been protected from White Zetsu, he had not been afforded the same luxury. Hinata squinted more closely at the face, obscured by the animal mask. Behind the eye holes, she saw the faint outlines of pupil-less lilac eyes. A Hyuga, then. One of her own family. Dead, gone forever. He would be honored, and forgotten about right after.

If she looked at his bare forehead, no doubt there would be a curse seal there. Or maybe it was a she; you could never tell with the ANBU armor. Anonymous servitude. Lived in a cage, died in one. She wondered if they had ever spoken with each other before now, other than the mandatory formal greeting during the annual clan festivities.

Probably not. She'd never been social, limiting her interaction to her father, her sister, Neji, and her personal maids. Hinata clenched her fists.

"Stay _down_ – " Sasuke flinched as he deflected another flying piece of – something – with his bare hands. "It's not – "

"Don't do this to me," she gasped. "If I do nothing, I'll definitely die. I cannot stand back and let you guys die for me, if I am not willing to do the same for you."

"Awww, how touching," Hidan sneered. "I'll make it nice and slow for you. Just to give you more time to spend your last moments with your team. I'm _that_ nice, see?"

Hinata didn't hate a lot of things. She didn't like hatred in general, because it was such a terrible and tiring thing to hold in yourself all the time.

But she thought…she could get on board with hating the man standing right behind her. The man who liked hurting and killing people because – it _amused_ him. And they couldn't even get him back because he was a stupid immortal.

To have to deal with someone like that was inherently unfair, but then again, the world itself was not a fair place. She had no choice in who her enemies were, as people rarely did, and so she could only make the best of the situation. If she was to fight a so-called immortal, then so be it; she would do it, and she would either walk away from that fight a winner or dead.

 _Everyone has a weakness. Even immortals._

She was a woman of science, and she knew – there was no such thing as immortality. All men must die, one way or another. That was the first thing she had learned as a healer. Humans, in all their infinite creativity, may skirt around Death and even cheat him for a while – but sooner or later, the reapers would get their due.

Without warning, Hinata slammed her elbow into Hidan's gut.

She noticed his grunt of shock in satisfaction; he hadn't expected her, a heavily injured little girl, to react so strongly. Reasonable of him to think so. Despite her activated Byakugan, she could barely see anything but her target. Her vision was tunneling, thanks to her blood and chakra loss. She could only maintain enough to keep him in sight; her natural blind spot had expanded to three times its normal size and her range, which she had developed to several kilometers normally, was now limited to right in front of her face.

But fear was a hell of a drug, and any threat of an imminent and painful death far outweighed a few third-degree burns.

And so, even as her entire body creaked in protest, Hinata pulled her arm back and shoved her fist knuckle-first into the dirt.

 _RRRRMMMMMBBBBBBLLLLLLL_

Hidan stumbled, first from the sheer force behind the impact of her elbow, and then from his lost footing as the ground crumbled to pieces beneath their feet, taking his partially formed circle with it. For a second, he looked almost stunned, but then he laughed. "Damn Hyugas," he muttered. "So predictable. What are you gonna do, fight me?"

"Yeah, I am, actually," she said, charging him head-on.

Just kidding. She was high on adrenaline, not stupid.

Before Hidan noticed her feint, she ducked. A cloud of ash, courtesy of Asuma-sensei, flew over her head and hit him right in the face. He blinked, shielding his eyes with his forearms – then Sasuke flipped over him and kicked the handle of his scythe. The weapon twisted out of his grasp around the fulcrum of his wrist – Hidan reached for it with his other hand – but then Choji punched him and he had to redivert his attention to block the blow. The scythe went skidding harmlessly across the charred forest floor before it came to a stop, trapped in some underbrush.

Hinata packed her knuckles with chakra and punched him in the chest.

She felt his chakra nodes pop underneath her knuckles. More importantly, however, she also felt the cells surrounding them splitting – as expected from a person with advanced healing abilities.

She could use this.

His taijutsu might have been hellishly powerful, far better than Hinata's, even though that was what her clan specialized in. But that was not what _she_ specialized in, no matter how much her father wished it. With a manic grin that she didn't know she was capable of, she shoved a glowing green fist of medical chakra at Hidan's chest.

This man could not be hurt. But logic stood that he could still _heal_ , otherwise he'd be a mess of dripping parts by now, not very useful for fighting.

The trouble was, medicine was a very tricky field. The reason why medic-nin were required to have such good chakra control was because "treatment" in the _wrong_ place was worse than no healing at all. Antidotes administered when no poisons were present could end up acting as poisons themselves. Miracle pills taken not according to prescription could be fatal. Unnecessary operations meant to get rid of problems that did not exist could create problems of their own.

And even something as simple as healing – stimulating cell division to patch up an injury – could be deadly if there was no injury to patch up.

Hidan staggered back, glaring at her. "What the hell?" he spat.

Hinata grabbed him by his ugly oversized collar. Swept his leg out from underneath him. Flipped him to the ground. Straddled his chest. Shoved his face into the dirt.

And proceeded to completely _wail_ into him, using hands, knees, teeth, anywhere she could reach. Terror had turned her into an animal. There was nothing gentle about these fists.

So unrefined. Hiashi Hyuga would certainly have an aneurysm.

(Fuck Hiashi Hyuga.)

Normally, in order to sustain the healing process, the medic-nin would have to be actively channeling chakra into the wounded area to keep the cells dividing. But this man was an immortal. He certainly did not need a medic-nin to aid him. His cells would continue to divide, at an accelerated rate, long after she had left him alone.

Which was why Hinata was doing it. And at _ridiculous_ rates.

Unregulated cell division.

Out of control growth.

A nasty cut or broken bone that took normal people months to regenerate could be done within minutes by a skilled medic-nin. So a man who could heal himself instantaneously – with medical ninjutsu added on top of that –

A cancerous mass that took months to become visible normally could manifest itself in under a minute with this guy. Even if the effects were visually invisible to anyone without a Byakugan, it didn't make them any less dangerous. She estimated his lungs and arteries would clog within a few minutes. His organs would start shutting down soon after. His body would starve itself as it kept siphoning off energy to feed trillions of useless cells. Each tumor that blossomed underneath his skin was like a sweet, sweet flower of justice.

Her tirade was cut off when Hidan clocked her around her temples. Hinata flew back and landed on her injured back, _hard_. Despite what Hinata had done to him, he still had a few good minutes before he was fully incapacitated. A lot could happen in a few minutes, as they had all just experienced. Even more so because Hidan had managed to get his scythe back.

Hinata watched as Choji, Asuma, and Sasuke formed a protective triangle around her and prepared for the worst.

The worst did come, but not from Hidan.

* * *

If there was anything that Sasuke could call the most terrifying thing in the world, it would be hearing that ear-splitting scream of despair again. The same one he himself had screamed the night his entire world had been ripped apart, his whole family slaughtered in cold blood.

But coming from someone else's throat.

Even though the voice was unfamiliar, Sasuke felt his heart tear for whoever it was all the same. The pain he had felt as a child, that sinking pit of darkness that came from losing everything…he wouldn't wish it on anyone. Not even the person who he hated the most, though arguably that might have been because Itachi had already brought it all upon himself.

More chilling than the memory of suffocating from Orochimaru's Killer Intent during the Chunin Exams, more horrifying than the illusion of his parents' deaths that Itachi had forced upon him, more painful than anything he had ever experienced before – it was hearing this, the universal call of anguish that too many, _far too many_ , people had in common.

The shriek of rage came back again, and in the dark, silhouetted against the sky, Sasuke saw a great, pale, floating mass of – _something_ – flying around, tearing through the forest like a flood but with something dry and harsh and angry instead of water – then there was more screeching and crumbling and roaring in anger…he smelled a faint tinge of blood and Killer Intent…

Dry dust exploded onto the ground. His eyes watered; his nose closed itself off. There were tiny, sharp little particles flying against his face. Sasuke realized it was sand.

"Shit. Rogue jinchuuriki," Naruto said, his voice a strange whisper-murmur, too quiet to her and yet unbearably loud at the same time. "Powerful, but also more likely to cause collateral damage and friendly fire than be helpful. Chances are he's mentally and emotionally compromised for whatever reason; that's the most common cause of even the strongest bijuu seals breaking. And if he runs off, he'll only be captured again by someone else down the road. He's coming this way. We have to contain him, _now_."

The way he said it, it was like he was reciting passages from a textbook, or speaking from personal experience –

Oh, who was he kidding. The dobe? And _textbooks?_ Naruto was far smarter than most people gave him credit for, but he never was, and never would be, a classical scholar.

Choji's face went from battle-high blood red to pasty white in less than a second. "I don't suppose Shikamaru – or Ino – "

Thirty seconds. They had _thirty seconds_ of victory. In that span of time, they had gone from celebrating finally killing Kakuzu, back to square one when both Ino and Shikamaru were knocked out cold from trying to go up against Zetsu, to minor success in fending off Hidan, back to square negative one now that they had a godforsaken _rogue jinchuuriki_ running at their heels. Speaking of Hidan, he seemed to have abandoned them, the Ichibi seeming like a better prize, still under the delusion that he was immortal and protected by his precious Jashin-sama. Sasuke wondered how long he had before he realized just how seriously Hinata had fucked him up. He didn't seem like the brightest sort.

"Hinata," Naruto begged.

"I'll…" she swallowed nervously as she looked between Naruto's two teammates. She seemed to make her decision, as Ino was already being cared for by Kakashi-sensei, and knelt over Shikamaru. "I'll do my best here. Go on."

"Your teacher knows way more about sealing than I do," Asuma-sensei told Naruto nervously. "I doubt he'll be able to transmit information to us quickly enough without Ino's Mind Jutsu. He'll need to be physically present if he plans on being useful against – that."

"He's also the only one here who knows enough about lightning chakra to help Ino," Naruto replied darkly. "Fine way of repaying her, considering that if it weren't for her, we'd still be tied down fighting all the White Zetsu things."

"Of course, if the One-Tail loses all control, then she might as well die anyway, along with the rest of us," said Sasuke. "All of us are capable of fighting White Zetsu. But only he knows enough to tie down a bijuu. And if it goes loose, then it doesn't matter whether they killed those Akatsuki were not."

"Well – last time – Shikamaru and Ino also – " Naruto began. "Nevermind. This is an executive decision, as the leader of Team 7." And also the only fighting body left on Team 7, but whatever.

Last time. Yeah. Sasuke chose not to mention it. "Now what?"

"We stop it. Duh." And with that, Naruto walked into the waves of sand and disappeared.

"So…" Sasuke watched the golden Tanuki grow above the tree line until it dwarfed even Choji. "We're fucked, then?"

"Yeah, basically."

Choji whistled. "So, same as usual."

* * *

On either side of him, a group of his own clones stood guard. They'd be protecting him during this operation; as the designated sealer it had to be done. Or, designated substitute sealer. Well, nondesignated substitute's substitute, since the first was supposed to be Kakashi-sensei and the next was supposed to be Shikamaru, under normal circumstances. Simply put, it was because he was the only one who could. And also, because by now, Naruto was better equipped to deal with that sort of role, his raw combat power having far outstripped anyone else's. Hopefully Kakashi-sensei wasn't freaking out too badly on the other end.

(Oh, who was he kidding. Of course he was.) For all the independence he had imparted on them during training, Kakashi-sensei was a fiercely overprotective individual when confronted with real-life situations.

Naruto didn't get far before he was intercepted. The One-Tail was literally running around fifty meters in front of him, and he couldn't even _get to it_ because _this fucking asshole_ swinging around his giant scythe _that was in no way practical_ was perched in front of his face like a dumb fucking duck.

He was not a happy camper, to say the least.

"Hey, dipshit," Naruto yelled, because he was so fucking _done_ , as in, honestly, who else in the history of Konoha has had all of their B-rank missions, all _three for three_ , turn into A and S-ranks right in front of their faces for something that was totally not their fault whatsoever? "The hell is that? Are you compensating for something?"

Evidently, given Hidan's reaction, that was not a polite form of greeting in any country or culture in existence. Naruto took this as a hint to run as fast as he could.

Hidan growled and attempted to pursue him, but ran straight into a tripwire set by one of Naruto's clones and faceplanted in the ground. It would have been comical if things hadn't been going to shit so awfully around them.

Right after that, an enormous fist of sand wrapped around him. Hidan screamed and whacked at it indiscriminately with his scythe, but since you couldn't exactly draw blood from a colossus of dry dirt and eroded rock, he had little success. Within seconds, he'd been crushed and shredded simultaneously into hundreds of tiny chunks of flesh. Pulverized bits of muscle and other organs Naruto didn't want to know the identity of dangled from the trees.

Through all that, Hidan remained alive. Only this time, he didn't have Kakuzu around to sew him back up. His body only lay there. In multiple pieces. Couldn't even scream or curse, not when his skull, tongue, throat, and lower jawbone were all lying at least ten meters from each other.

 _Hey, uh, Kyuubi,_ Naruto tried. _A little help?_

The fox smirked. _Now? I thought you didn't want my evil tainting your pretentious perfect little angel act._

 _And_ I _thought you didn't want to die,_ Naruto snapped back. _Unless you're_ afraid _of the Ichibi._

 _WHY YOU LITTLE – I WOULD NEVER LOSE TO THAT SORRY STUCK-UP TANUKI IN A MILLION YEARS; HOW DARE YOU SUGGEST SUCH BLASPHEMY –_

But then it calmed down when it realized that Naruto had just successfully goaded it yet again, and reverted back to stubborn grumbling. Naruto shook his head and smiled to himself. _Well, that was easy._

 _Do you even have a plan?_ the fox asked.

He'd make it up as he went along. For a second, Naruto considered attempting to use a variation of the same plan Shikamaru always liked using – mainly, using an enemy's own strength against him – but he immediately dismissed it. The bijuu, after all, were chakra constructs, and unlike Orochimaru they had no physical bodies to burn out or destroy. The blowout would only be toxic enough to kill everyone with incompatible chakra within a five-kilometer radius.

So no, he could not use the Ichibi's chakra against itself.

 _Don't you want to try reasoning with your madman of a sensei?_ The fox asked.

Naruto shot a dubious glance over to Kakashi-sensei, who was still pleading under his breath, "It's okay, please, please, _please_ , just hold on for, I don't know, ten minutes, please just _stay_ stable so I can neutralize all the residual chakra in your system – fucking hell, I turn my eyes away from you lot for a couple seconds and you pull this shit and _I didn't ask for you to jump in front of me you stupid self-sacrificing girl you didn't need to do that we would have been fine if you'd been patient enough to give it a few more minutes_ − "

Something told Naruto he wasn't really talking about Ino anymore. The fact that both Hidan's and Kakuzu's corpses were now mincemeat wasn't making things any better, either.

 _Okay, yeah,_ the Fox agreed. _I wouldn't let him within ten meters of any sealing equipment while he's in that state, either. Not that he'd be any help against Shukaku._

Naruto frowned. _Shukaku who?_

 _That's his name._

 _What, him? I thought he was Gaara._

The fox snorted. _No, idiot. The Ichibi. Its name is Shukaku._

That made Naruto pause, despite the rogue bijuu in front of his face. _Oh._

 _What, you didn't think we had names? You thought we were just giant mythical constructs of chakra and damnation?_

 _Well, you kind of_ are _,_ Naruto pointed out.

 _Silence, peasant._

 _So what's_ your _name, then?_ Naruto asked.

The fox was silent for a bit, and Naruto thought he wouldn't answer, but then, he said, _Kurama._

Kurama. So the Fox had a name after all. Interesting. _Nice to meet you, Kurama. I'll remember you if I die._

 _How touching. No you fucking won't die; I'd never live it down if I lost to_ that _bastard._

The humor was strangely relieving. It was stupid, it was pointless, but it helped Naruto calm down. _Oh. So you DO care. Good to know._

 _SHUT UP,_ the Kyuubi growled. _Listen, maggot. Dealing with you on a few tails is way different from going up against a thing with fuinjutsu built directly into his suite of powers. I can beat him in any regular battle of strength, but you'd be playing into his strengths if you choose fuinjutsu._

But a regular battle could possibly kill Gaara. Naruto didn't know much about the kid, but in addition to being important to Konoha (otherwise why would Ino's father be protecting him), he was also a human being. It was a stupid excuse, for shinobi were expected to kill other human beings all the time, but it was an excuse nonetheless. Kurama rolled his eyes at this.

 _Fine. Have it your way. Don't blame me if you fail._

Naruto sighed. So much for good luck and a quiet mission. Team 7's communicator down. Their general strategist out cold. Their Jonin sensei losing it. He himself barely keeping them all together. And also having to seal a fucking bijuu when he could barely hold a square of chakra paper without turning it into confetti.

Someone up there must have hated them a great deal. Naruto couldn't for his life figure out why.

But he didn't give a damn why when all that sand was headed his way. Or rather, headed right where the White Zetsu clones were. Where Kakashi-sensei, Ino, and Shikamaru all were as well.

Naruto sprinted forward and threw himself between them.

He felt his own blood on his hands.

Everything whited out.

* * *

 _The Dimension of the Dog Summons_

The first thing Naruto noticed when he opened his eyes was all the grass.

The lighting was dim, but not dark. A ball of fur wound around his ankles.

"Pakkun?"

"That's me." Pakkun grinned. "You're better at this than we thought, kid. At first we all just assumed that Kakashi was spoiling you out of personal bias, but then more and more of us kept disappearing to the human world."

"Listen, that's really nice, but I'm kind of in a bad situation – " Naruto babbled. "I have to seal a freaking bijuu. Like there's another kid out there, and he's just like me. And Kakashi-sensei is busy saving Ino's life. I mean, I could totally fight that kid, hold him off while Kakashi-sensei finishes whatever he's doing – but – I don't know, I don't wanna hurt him, I'm just half scared and half freaking out and _fuck my team is still out there_ – "

Pakkun held up a paw. "Calm down, kid. Time runs differently in our dimension. What is imminent danger in your world is not imminent in ours." He began walking down a worn path into what looked like a very deep canyon. "Tell you what. I'll take you to the boss. He'll know what to do."

"Really? He's – he's real? I kinda thought Kakashi-sensei was just trolling me…again…"

"You spent enough chakra and blood reverse summoning _yourself_ into this place, which most would call impossible, but what do I know," Pakkun said. "The fact that you managed such a feat under pressure at your age would warrant an audience with the literal top dog himself, I'd say."

"So, uh, this…Boss. How, er, what's he like?"

"Tough but fair. Pretty normal in personality. A little on the big side, but not unreasonably enormous."

"Oh," said Naruto, wondering what special ability this dog must have had, to command so many other dogs.

"It's true that we are small, and that our raw power is less than that of the toads or snakes or slugs. But we dogs choose to focus on a different skill: endurance," Pakkun explained, though that did nothing to clear up the mystery. "You see, humans evolved, not as ambush predators, but as persistence hunters. You, my bottomless chakra pit of a friend, should know the concept of pursuing a larger and stronger target until they surrender of exhaustion. Konoha itself thrives on wars of attrition, using its superior population and natural resources to outlast an enemy they would otherwise have trouble outfighting."

"Yeah, I get that. So what does that have to do with dogs?"

"Dogs are man's best friend, not only because we are naturally social creatures, but also because we are some of the few animals that can keep up with the stamina of a human. It is fitting, then, that instead of utilizing the natural chakra available in sage mode, we have a… _different_ sort of natural chakra." Despite his height, Pakkun seemed to be looking down at him. "Tell me, Naruto, what is the most persistent force in nature? One that will always be there, waiting for you, in the end? One that will always eventually find you, no matter how powerful you are, no matter how well you hide, no matter how fast you run?"

"I…" Even without having to think, Naruto knew the answer was Death.

"It's not a question you have to answer. The solution is already right in front of you. Hey!" yelled Pakkun. "I brought the kid!"

Naruto looked up in the direction of Pakkun's voice and nearly tripped over his own feet when he saw who the Dog Boss was.

"Welcome," said the three heads of the Guardian of Hell. "We have been waiting for you."

* * *

 **A/N:** **Again, if there's anything confusing, don't hesitate to comment.**

 **Yes, the boss of the dog summons is Cerberus. Yes, I know it's from Greek, not Japanese mythology.**

… **Come on, this is the** _ **DOG**_ **Boss! They were** _ **asking**_ **for it!**


	56. This Song Was Sung Before

**A/N: Sorry for the late update; my laptop broke and I only recently received a new one.**

 **If there's anything you don't understand, comment while signed in so I can reply to your questions. Hint: remember that mysterious technique Shikaku was trying to teach Shikamaru way back from chapter 8, the one I mentioned in the author's note as not a new invention but something Kishimoto already introduced in canon? You might want to refresh your memory.**

* * *

 _The Dimension of the Dog Summons_

Kushina was dead. She knew this.

Minato was dead. She knew this also.

The three-headed hellhound before them was proof enough of that.

Naruto was alive, and that was all that mattered to her. Her beautiful, precious, wonderful boy. She was so proud of him; she loved him so much she thought her heart might burst.

"…I – " Naruto turned, and caught sight of them. "You guys are my parents," he said.

"That's us," she said.

"You know, I'd normally question how this is possible, but at this point I don't even care. I've seen weirder shit than dead people talking."

His face was completely blank, neutral, level. And it hurt Kushina, to see him so guarded and reserved before them. To see a young man with so much heart, so much natural expression, feel like he had to hide himself before them.

"I'm sorry," Minato suddenly blurted. "For burdening you with the Kyuubi – "

There was a growl. It was then that she noticed the fox's presence, angry and menacing, and yet the most calm and least malicious she had ever seen it be.

"…I'm sorry," Minato said softly. "For leaving you. For your awful childhood. For saying sorry when it doesn't mean or change anything."

Naruto cocked his head to the side and narrowed his eyes.

"…Ok, I get the first two, but seriously? You're apologizing for… _apologizing_?"

Kushina swallowed.

Then she burst out laughing, because that was _such_ a Minato thing to do.

Minato looked like he'd choked on a lime. "What's so funny?" he demanded, which only made Kushina laugh harder. He looked around, and turned bright red. "It's the seal, isn't it? You're laughing at my horrible craftsmanship. Oh my god, it's so embarrassing. I always _told_ you, I'm a math guy; all this Uzushiogakure soul-fuinjutsu stuff is way out of my league. 'Stick to your strengths, Minato,' I always used to tell myself. 'Don't mess around with the things you're bad at.' We were _supposed_ to meet him separately and the yin and yang parts of the fox were _supposed_ to be in different compartments and he wasn't _supposed_ to see us until he got his ninth tail and oh my god it looks like a third grader with crayons and tape made it and I don't even – whatever."

Kushina doubled over, wheezing. "Can you believe this _NERD_?"

"What?!" Minato cut his tirade short in an indignant splutter. "Woman, you _married_ this _NERD_! I'd like to see _you_ design a better bijuu containment matrix under pressure!"

"Naruto, Naruto, tell him he's a total _NERD_!"

"Don't believe your mother. She's lying. She was always pulling pranks in the Academy," Minato pleaded. "I'm not a nerd; listen to your father."

Naruto chewed his lip as he considered this. "You're not a total nerd," he finally said.

"Hah! See!" Minato crowed triumphantly.

"You're a total _dork_."

Minato dropped to his knees in despair. Kushina and Naruto high-fived over his prostrate body.

"You two are so _mean_!" he wailed. "I'll never recover from this."

Kushina ruffled his hair. "Love you too, honey." She turned to Naruto. "And you as well."

Naruto was laughing, but his shoulders were also shaking. Kushina took him in her arms and rubbed his back, while also sparing a moment – when her son's face was buried in her shoulder, and her husband's face was buried in the ground – to flip off the Kyuubi, who had been pulling disgusted faces at their sickeningly sweet familial display.

"As amusing as it is to see the great Yellow Flash of Konoha in such a state," the hellhound interrupted, "We would like to reassure you that the Kyuubi's seal remains intact. The dead and the living speak only at our discretion."

Minato, blinking, half-spluttered, "H-how?"

Rolling his eyes, the hound answered, "And publicly reveal infinite avenues of possible abuse? We think not. Of all the summons in existence, _we_ were chosen by the Shinigami to be his gatekeeper. Not the snakes, not the frogs, not the slugs – but _us_. We did not come this far to lose everything because because some idiot human was foolish enough to offend Death. Whatever secrets we reveal will be to only Naruto, and only when we deem him ready."

"Offend…Death…?" Naruto asked.

"You do realize that the Shinigami could have put a stop to Edo Tensei, Corpse Reanimation, and the Rinnegan whenever he wanted to, if he wanted to, right? He didn't, because he doesn't punish innocent people who die normally – so these special snowflakes who think they're smart enough to cheat Death are literally his only source of entertainment. The deeper they dig themselves, the more 'fun' he gets to have with them when they finally die, and thus the more incentive he has to just 'let it happen'."

"So – the Nidaime – " Minato paled.

"Before you try to explain that he wasn't trying to revive dead people, only temporarily bring them back so he could listen to their wisdom, the Shinigami doesn't give a damn," the hellhound interrupted. "You of all people should know what an ass he is. He's the friggin' Shinigami; you think he needs the extra power of a soul sacrifice to seal a bijuu? He was bored, he needed _justification_ , and you gave him the perfect excuse. He is an eternity old; he stopped caring about all of you after the first ten generations."

"WHAT?"

"Truth be told, Minato Namikaze, you were lucky. All he did was eat you. Considering what he could have done, a stomach-prison where nothing ever happens isn't bad at all. And Naruto here won't even have to worry about any of that. We are obligated by contract to care about our summoners at least 0.00000000444 iotas more than every other human being," the hellhound said, as if that was supposed to be reassuring. Turning to her son, it continued, "Naruto, if you ever consider doing something stupid, we will quickly bite your head off before you can, so the Shinigami will have no choice but to put you with the rest of the people who died normally."

"What the hell!" Kushina snapped. "You can't just threaten us for being mortal – "

"Listen, lady, it's not a threat if the alternative is much worse, and two, you're already dead so I don't see what's so bad about such an arrangement."

"Mom, it's fine!" Naruto stepped in front of her when she tried to charge the dog. "Look, I promise I'll…be reasonable."

The three heads snorted. "It would be embarrassing if you weren't. Even _Kakashi_ was self-aware enough to not damn himself for all eternity. He might be a madman, but at least he knows exactly how mad he is."

"Is that why you two never...?" Naruto trailed off.

"Best not to accept a power that he knew he'd never be able to use responsibly. Trapping himself here talking to dead loved ones forever was the least of it. More than we can say for some other of our summoners. You, on the other hand, are sane enough that you might make some use of our powers after all. But enough of that. We have all the time in the world to discuss the mechanics of our work. You wished to learn how to persuade the Ichibi to stand down, and we are gifting you that opportunity. We would not have allowed you to contact the souls of your parents otherwise. Speaking of which, you have ten minutes. Hurry up."

"Oh," said Naruto, turning back to face them. "Um. Hi. Again."

"Hi," Kushina whispered.

"Mom? Dad?" Naruto asked timidly, and it broke her heart. "Mom, Dad, it's horrible out there. I'm supposed to lead this mission, and I don't know what to do. We just killed two S-rank nin and another thing that I'm not even sure is human, and meanwhile there's a kid who's just like me, only he can't control himself…"

Minato took his hand. "Naruto…"

"Yeah?"

"I – I don't know how to start this," Minato confessed. "But, when I was alive…I always tried my best to act nice. To _be_ nice. I wanted every bit to be a good person. I wanted to go to heaven when I died. I still tried to convince myself that it was possible, even after the battle that won me my nickname, where I singlehandedly murdered thousands of Iwa nin with one technique, even after I used the outcome of that battle to further my own fame and reputation and political power. Now that I'm dead, I've had time to think. And I've decided that letting you, at least, know the truth, is better. The world is cruel, as I'm sure you already know. Sometimes, the only deterrence to cruelty is repaying it in kind. Yet other times, being kind is the solution to cruelty. True power is knowing when to use which, to be loved and feared in equal measure, for you will never be strong if you have undisciplined loyalty, while discipline without any loyalty is asking to get betrayed the moment you are weak." Minato straightened up. "I love you, Naruto. With every bit of my being."

Kushina chuckled. "I'd move the sun and the moon and all the oceans in the world for you, Naruto. Never forget that."

Naruto was sobbing in earnest now.

"Thank you," he sobbed. "Thank you for saying it. Out loud. I needed to hear that. Every day, since I was small enough to know what I was missing − I love you, Mom. Dad."

"As many times as you need to hear it. As many times as your soul needs to become stronger," Kushina promised. "Now, I believe there is someone else who needs your help. Your earlier question, Minato − the seal was meant to open when it faced a certain influx of power, right?"

"Right."

"You designed it to trigger when that influx was equal to the power of all the Kyuubi's nine tails. But," she grinned, "there is another case that would require the same amount of energy."

"Energy out equals energy in," he whispered to himself. "To release a bijuu…or to _seal one back away_. Of _course._ " He slapped himself in the face.

Naruto chuckled and turned to leave. "So, kindness?"

She took his hands in her own and began channeling her chakra through them. "Kindness. All an empty soul needs, is the grasp of a full heart, and you, my beautiful, amazing, wonderful son, have that in spades."

* * *

 _Black Zetsu_

So this was it, then. My observation skills. My strategic ability. Gone. And of all the spare chakra Naruto had, I could use absolutely zero, unless I wanted the incompatibilities to blow up and kill us all.

Fuck dammit.

 _Pull yourself together; you are on a MISSION; why the hell are you afraid, you won against Itachi, you beat him, you have no reason to fear something as stupid and mundane was water; you were_ supposed _to have already gotten over this, what is wrong with you?!_

But I was not looking back. I was in the _present._ When one is caught in the heat of the moment, one does not have the luxury of 20/20 hindsight.

(and gods damn it, but I despised myself so much for my weakness, my total lack of control, not only over my own body, but over my own brain)

I was scared out of my fucking mind. Like, I've been in a lot of situations where I really did think I was going to die before, but all of those situations were before I had the chance to try anything, so they usually resolved themselves once I took action. This, however – this was after I'd already exhausted all my options.

 _We're done for._

 _We're all going to die._

I despised myself, my own mind. For the uncontrolled desperation and despair. I wished I could be separate from all this. Which was, obviously, very counterintuitive, because – I was making these very thoughts, about separating myself from my brain, with…my brain. When I normally thought of myself, I pictured my own physical appearance, as any regular person did, but in reality, my mind was _me_ , my body only an extension of it; my brain was a self-aware piece of meat projecting itself onto a shell of bone and skin. So wanting myself and my brain to be separate entities was impossible and counterintuitive.

And I know I'm not making sense, but that's what happens when your brain, and also your brain, are split. Yes, that makes even less sense. I'm sorry.

I couldn't see. I couldn't feel. I couldn't think. It was an all-consuming exhaustion that completely distorted every thought in my head except for

close your eyes

nap

tired

sleep

I blacked out −

 _DO NOT. YOU SLEEP HERE AND YOU DIE._

− I jerked myself awake. _Panic._ I couldn't see. I couldn't see. _I couldn't see_ – wait, no, I could see. It was just – everything was inverted, like the inside of the Tsukuyomi. And my head was strangely…full. Flooded. With too much perception, everywhere, and I thought that this must have been what Ino felt like when she tried to communicate Kakashi-sensei's sealing instructions to me back in Wave, or perhaps I was a Hyuuga activating the Byakugan for the first time, or a fly experiencing the world through compound eyes.

And suddenly I felt old and shriveled, the way the last survivor of a plague looks at himself and says, _oh, this must be what a thousand-year-old tree feels like when it finally dies at last._

Because in front of me was myself.

I was staring at _myself._

Black Zetsu's black mass was still hovering over my body, but it was no longer trying to suffocate me. Instead, it was staring. Staring, at me. Upon its face – or whatever I suppose you would call two vague yellow eye-shaped dots and a large mouth-shaped slash in a floating human-shaped puddle of ink – was a strange look of surprise. With, perhaps, a hint of terror.

I peered around me. All of the White Zetsu that had been lucky enough not to be hit with Ino's technique before – and I assume now that it was Black Zetsu that had caused her sudden failure, because she would have been fine had she only been hitting the White Zetsu tree-clones – were frozen. Petrified. The ones Ino had killed were charcoal dust, as would be expected from wood being burnt by lightning. But the others, the ones that had survived the initial onslaught, were ghostly, gone, like they had had all the life force sucked out of them.

 **"How?"**

I wondered that myself. Ino had been shocked into unconsciousness just by touching this thing. So why was I still okay?

Still confused, I looked down at the ground. And I saw –

My shadow.

(What the hell?)

It was –

 _Split._

Disconnected. Two pieces, without even the tiniest sliver to connect them. _But that's impossible; my body is still in one piece?_ I gaped, and felt my jaw move, but my face looked – normal. Still. My moving jaw was not my own, but immaterial, weightless, as if it was nothing but a shadow. Because I was – me. I was my own shadow, and somehow, I was in two places at once, my shadow-self staring at my own face which was staring at my shadow-self.

I looked down at my hands. They were devoid of light, of mass, of matter. I looked back up again. My mind was in two places at once. I was watching the world through two fields of vision. And through the eyes set in my human body, which was staring at my shadow-self which was staring at my human body, I saw my own silhouette − infinitely many of them, tucked inside each other, like two mirrors facing each other, reflecting their own light back and forth forever. There was my face, completely black, with only my features etched in yellow, my eyes and mouth a smiling streak of a mask, exactly in the same design as Black Zetsu's own.

 **"You** _ **will**_ **submit."** Its anger rose in temperature. As did mine.

Submit, was it? A challenge, was it?

 **"No."**

 **"You** _ **dare**_ **?"** Black Zetsu hissed. **"None shall defy me and remain standing."**

None shall defy me and remain standing.

None shall defy me and remain standing.

None shall –

Fuck, can you fucking _believe_ this fucking thing? What the hell! The people I cared about were dying out there and all this fucking piece of eldritch shit could say to me was some entitled bullshit about defiance, like it was fucking _born_ deserving to rule the world or some shit? Ino at the age of two could do better than that, that, that –

I stared straight into its eyes and gave it the biggest "fuck you" I could.

 **"And yet here I am."**

Whatever this – this _thing_ was – it evidently was not used to being refused. Black Zetsu screamed. It clawed at my brain; it dunked me headfirst in burning sand; it dragged me through a thousand dimentions of fire and brimstone.

But my will refused to budge. It was tar, but I was very definition of the absence of light. In that moment I personally embodied what it needed to exist. My fingers phased through its head, its gut, its heart, and with every puncture all I could think was an incoherent rage.

The cold came back, whooshing past my ears, and suddenly, I was gone. For just a split second, I was hanging in nonexistence. And then I was viewing the world from my regular body again.

 _What…the…hell?_

Before my face, as far as the eye could see – which was not very far, seeing as we were in a forest that Kakuzu had just half-burnt down – were fields upon fields of dead trees. They were not like the ones Ino had killed, electrified into black charcoal, but white. White, like death, all of them drained dry, their empty husks dotting the landscape like a monoculture orchard hit with a fungal blight.

 _When had that happened?_

Vaguely in my mind, I recalled my father. I heard his voice, saying, _"Those who walk the shadows may very well become one with them"_ over and over and over again. I thought of the technique he had invented for me, _because_ of me –

 _Was that…me?_

I thought of that technique. I kept thinking of it, of how I always had so much trouble with it, of how I was always so frustrated with it because it was the first technique I'd ever faced that didn't come entirely naturally to me. I thought of how, despite all that, I had taken my father's warnings seriously and successfully resisted the temptation to go sneak off and try to practice it alone. I thought of the cold nights, the blackouts, the exhaustion, the headaches, and of course the rabbits, those gods-be-damned rabbits.

 _But that was impossible._ I still hadn't mastered it to a level which I could use in the field.

 **"But you had."**

I didn't. I couldn't have.

 **"You always knew how."**

Preposterous. Every night, when I attempted to use that technique, I always ended up blacking out before I could successfully split my shadow. If I had already mastered my father's technique, would I have willingly continued to suffer with him by the campfire every night, taking precious time out of my day to accomplish nothing except blackouts –

Blackouts.

 **"You've always succeeded since your first try."**

Shit.

 **"You just never opened your eyes to witness it."**

So I opened my eyes.

Black Zetsu was gone. Had been gone for quite some time. This entire time, I had been talking to no one but myself.

* * *

 _Fire Country_

"No, no, no, don't you _dare_ – "

Kakashi heard the rumble before he felt it. Immediately he threw himself down over Ino, bracing his wrists around her head and neck. The bark on the tree trunks had been stripped smooth, sandblasted down like a beachside cliff.

In the center of it was Naruto.

Naruto, and orange.

Orange, everywhere.

 _Orange?_

Kakashi's pulse spiked, and vomit rushed up his throat. _No no no no no this can't be happening no not him too –_

Asuma's hand landed on his shoulder. "Whoa, calm down. Different shade of orange, Kakashi. Relax. Look carefully."

 _Orange orange orange –_

But the orange was not that of the Kyuubi. It wasn't a malevolent neon blaze, but a calm, warm glow, a fire in the hearth in the middle of a winter storm. It was the color of the dawn rising over the Hokage Mountain, the color of both Minato and Kushina's fierce and unconditional love combined. It coated Naruto from head to toe, extending down his arms, searing the air and earth, exuding power with every link, and they were wrapping around the one-tailed tanuki like a bouquet of climbing vines, no, not vines, they were –

"…Oh," Kakashi whispered.

 _I would cross deserts and oceans to reach you,_ they sang, and with each chord the unyielding hatred of the Ichibi would subside. _I, too, have felt your sorrows and anger. Your tears are my tears, your night terrors my dreams, your blood my own; we are brothers, you and I._

Chains.

Chakra chains.

Forged from the deepest piths of Uzushiogakure's eternally wandering soul.

 _Discard the daggers others have placed in you. Retrieve the blades you have placed in others. Let go of the double-edged sword you sheathe in your own heart._

In that moment, all the raw hard mathematical logic in the world seemed so insignificant and useless, dwarfed by the sheer emotional strength of – it was – Kakashi couldn't – he couldn't –

 _Though the desert nights are cold and dark tomorrow there always exists another dawn._

 _For I am the whirlpool tides, always again rising._

 _For I am Uzumaki,_ Naruto whispered, and his voice was as quiet as a million chanting ghosts, innumerable and breathtaking. _Who are you?_

It was funny. He'd been put in situations where he'd felt small and worthless before. Like nothing he ever did would make a difference. Like no matter what he tried, he wouldn't be able to protect the people he cared about. It always made him feel so, so awful.

And yet, here, somehow, it felt absolutely wonderful, knowing that instead of floating along in the universe, completely alone, he was instead existing as a part of something greater…

And that was more than okay by him.

 _I know who you wish to be, Gaara of the Desert, and who you are._

 _This is not who you are._

The poison receded, the waves of sand disappeared, the monster dissolved away to reveal a little boy just as beaten terrified as they all were.

Gaara sat down and began to cry.

* * *

Cold, slimy disappointment crept up Hinata's spine as soon as she saw why Inoichi Yamanaka was no longer sending their team any more messages.

Choji came forward, a question on his face. Hinata was forced to shake her head no. That was the universal sign. Everyone knew what that meant.

He was gone. They had arrived too late; there was nothing she could do.

She was a doctor, not a magician. She could pull men back from the brink of death, but she could not revive them once they had crossed that line. There was a difference between not being able to save a heavily injured person, and just…not being able to do anything at all. Both were equally saddening to a healer – having a chance to save a life but then failing, or not even getting that chance in the first place.

 _If only I hadn't been stupid enough to get injured,_ she berated herself. _I should have been saving him, not myself._ She cursed her stupid body for shutting down right when she needed it most. Inoichi Yamanaka had needed her help more than that, and she hadn't been able to give it −

As they inspected Hidan's sand-riddled corpse, Hinata suddenly got a very morbid idea, and immediately afterwards she wondered if something was wrong with her. Then she shrugged to herself; she was training to become a doctor. She dealt with internal organs, diseases, squishy things and death, on a regular basis. Morbid was a part of the job description, and collecting Hidan's remains for research would do more good than harm in the long run.

At that moment, a boy her age – the boy all this bloodshed had happened for – limped forward.

"Hello. How do you do? My name is…Gaara," he said, as if he was reading off notecards, unsure of his own identity.

Hinata stood there for a second, unsure of what to do, and then tentatively approached him. For all she knew, he could be unstable, and snap and turn on her instead. She had seen his rage just now, focused on their common enemy, thankfully, but now that he was gone, it could very well be her next. As a doctor, she was always taught to err on the side of caution. "Are you all right?"

"Inoichi. He – it's all my fault," Gaara whispered. "Those men were after me and they hurt all of you because of me and then Inoichi – he's – _he's_ – _because of me_ −"

"No, don't say that," Hinata whispered. "It's not your fault. It's never your fault. It was those bad, bad men who chose to attack you – " Which only went to reinforce the old rules she had learned, as a soldier, as a doctor, as a _human_ : no one was immortal. Anyone could die. At any time. "I'm supposed to be the medic," she added on. "If it's your fault, then it's mine, too."

Hinata cast another glance at Inoichi Yamanaka's lifeless form, still cooling on the ground. _Enemies or friends, ninja or civilian, man, woman, or child: anyone can die in any place at any time. Anyone._

Choji looked as if the entire world had been yanked out from underneath his feet. Hinata knew why. Though Ino-Shika-Cho was no longer a team for this generation, they were still close. Inoichi Yamanaka was – _was_ – a good friend of Chouza Akimichi; the man would have been an uncle to him in name if not in blood. Though, not just Choji. Inoichi Yamanaka had been a well-liked man within Konoha; even Hiashi Hyuga had few negative things to say about him as he normally did for most people.

"He was…" Choji began.

"…already beyond my help when we got here," she said quietly.

This man had not just been a shinobi of Konoha. He had been someone she personally knew. Someone her friends knew. Choji. Shikamaru. Ino. Naruto. The war had finally arrived at their doorsteps. And –

"Oh, god," Naruto whispered. "What are we going to tell Ino?"

Right at that moment, Ino chose to stir back into consciousness.

"Tell me what?"


	57. Nonexistence

**A/N: Again, apologies for the slow update, and thanks for your patience guys!**

 **For those of you looking forward to a more detailed Gaara/Team 7 interaction, it will happen soon. Maybe a few chapters from now.**

* * *

 _Fire Country_

He wanted to jump and scream, yell at everyone that everything was going to be okay, that he was Naruto Uzumaki, the greatest of the greatest of ninja since forever, and that he'd fix everything for all of them, no sweat.

But he didn't.

Because he was Naruto Uzumaki, and Naruto Uzumaki always kept his promises, meaning he couldn't carelessly throw around promises he was unable to keep.

The Sage of Six Paths had been the first person born with chakra, according to the legends – he'd been a _god_ – and even he couldn't solve every problem, save every man. Even he couldn't stop all war and end all suffering. Or, maybe he could, but that would be taking away people's choices, because part of suffering came from people themselves, and not the things around them. There could be no war, or famine, or disease – everyone could have everything they ever needed and more – and things still wouldn't be perfect. People would still argue, and get mad, or sad. It was their right, as humans. The problem was when they started hurting other people, dragging them down to their level, all so they could feel better about themselves.

Naruto didn't like thinking that people were born hurtful or mean or even evil, because babies were, y'know, _babies_. But people chose to do what they liked, to become what they wanted to be. Two people could be right but different and still argue. And being sad or mad was okay (he'd been that way before) as long as you didn't _stay_ that way. He could get people to stop fighting and hating each other, but he couldn't make people stop _arguing._

Because if he used his powers to force people to all stop arguing and be creepily happy _all_ the time, he'd have to make everyone think the same way, and that…was even more bad than simply letting people make their own mistakes.

So a problem like that, even the most powerful and perfect of gods couldn't fix. A problem like that, was up to humans to solve.

And Naruto quite liked being human. He could become as powerful as a god for all he cared, but he never would want to actually _be_ a god.

Maybe one day, he _would_ become as powerful as a god. If he was, then he'd try to make everyone as happy as possible. It would take a lot of work. Even then, he might not be able to solve _everyone's_ problems for them, because people needed to learn to be responsible and deal with things on their own sometimes. And some people would never be happy, no matter how much you gave them (as he learned after many D-ranks involving ungrateful customers).

Naruto knew that problems didn't always magically disappear. If they did, the world would be a pretty boring place.

 _Even if I could end all war and suffering, I wouldn't bring the dead back to life._ Messing around with life and death always ended badly. The Dog Boss had made that all too clear. He loved his friends so goddamn much, but he knew neither Ino nor Inoichi Yamanaka would accept him messing around with his own soul for their sake. _All the power in the world can't stop pain. It can only ease it with the passing of time._

Naruto hated thinking so much. Even if he was as smart as Shikamaru he would never be able to understand the entire world. You could never tell what anyone was thinking. No wonder why people fought so much, instead of trying to reason things out. Fighting was simple. It was easier to fight. The other guy was trying to hurt you and you were trying to hurt the other guy, and no matter who started it, you were merely trying to live to the next millisecond, never mind the next ten years. Why die for your country, when you could make the other guy die for his?

But of course war and suffering was always the most awful thing; it was what led to…to _this_ , in the first place.

(It was his mission, and he fucking blew it. He followed all the rules, did everything that was asked of him, brought home all the intel that Konoha wanted, and yet – )

(− and yet he'd failed the biggest mission of all, and the worst part was, it hadn't even been assigned to them.)

All he could do now was move forward to catch Ino in his arms as she collapsed to the ground, keening like her world had just completely ended.

It probably had.

* * *

 _Konoha_

I watched helplessly from the sidelines. I wanted to say something more, but I didn't know what. How could I? When a loved one died, there was little anyone could do apart from letting grief take its natural course. All any of us could do now was provide her our support. Which, I now realized I was pretty shit at.

Deciding I would inadvertently make things worse if I insisted on my direct involvement, I decided it would probably be best if I let Naruto take care of the emotional aspect of things. There were other things for me to give my attentions to. Things that might not have been as immediately painful to Ino as the loss of her father, but no less harmful.

"Did your summons bring any reply from Jiraiya?" I asked Kakashi-sensei.

"He'll meet us at the gate. If we're lucky, he'll be able to buy us a few days. Stalling, under the pretense of checking out Gaara's seal, while we do whatever we need to do," he answered.

That was not ideal, but no worse than I expected. Inoichi Yamanaka had been the center of a lot of Konoha's inner dealings. Exactly what, well, that was murky. Though my information network had grown, throughout most of Konoha, the patrons of the _Kunai_ bars and other shinobi hangouts, Tanyu, and the clients of Ino's gossip column – it provided me little insight as to what my father had been up to with the other clan heads. Leaks from the Hokage Tower were so much easier to get my hands on than leaks from my father's desk; he held his cards close to his chest and guarded them ferociously.

Which was annoying, but also comforting, in a way. Whatever my father was planning, it was undoubtedly not something we would want anyone outside of his little circle of friends to know. If I successfully managed to breach their silence, who else could?

Ino, of course, was in no state to get involved in any of this. I'd have to take care of it myself.

"What the hell happened back there, anyway?" Kakashi-sensei asked.

My mouth opened and closed. "I – I don't know," I said honestly. I wanted so badly to tell him about everything, but I had no idea how to begin, even.

"You're going to have to learn to deal with this water problem of yours," Kakashi-sensei said softly. I noticed he couldn't stop staring at his hands.

"When we get back," I muttered.

"For your information, it does get better. Not much. But something is better than nothing."

"That's – that's good."

"Ino, I understand how she killed all the Zetsu clones. I understand how lightning jutsu works, and how it can theoretically – now practically, thanks to Ino – be transferred over large insulated channels." Kakashi-sensei narrowed his eyes. "What I don't understand…is _you_."

I shrugged, trying to play my attitude off as nonchalant. "To be fair, I don't get it either."

Not that it worked on him. "You didn't overload their physical defenses, nor did you touch their chakra, nor did you engage them on a mental level," Kakashi-sensei recited as if out of habit, smoothly ticking off his fingers as he went along. No doubt discerning the abilities of a shinobi from the corpses they left behind was an important survival skill from his childhood. "The closest description I have for how they died is simply losing their will to live…except that sort of thing kills gradually."

I nodded. I could only imagine how creepy it was, to see a forest completely waste away into shadowy ghosts of themselves before my eyes. Like watching a time-lapse of those forgotten prisoners of war in the ANBU cells, once proud fighting shinobi reduced to lethargic skeletons, whose only crime was inhabiting that unlucky medium between being too skilled to die but not skilled enough to escape. "It's not something I can explain."

"Secret clan technique?"

"Sure, let's call it that," I said. "My dad's," I added quickly.

Kakashi-sensei hummed. "And he knows you have it?"

"Yes." This wasn't a lie.

"Are you going to talk to him about it, now that you've used it in the field?"

"I kind of have to, don't I?"

"I suppose you do."

I sighed. "So. About Gaara."

"Yes. Him." Kakashi-sensei was deep in thought. "I'll talk to Asuma-sensei. You talk to Choji. I don't think I have to explain to you why."

"Of course not." Politics was a wretched thing. It gave _me_ a nasty thrill, but I could easily understand why others avoided it like the plague.

Kakashi-sensei was one of those people. Unlike most of those who despised politics, however, it wasn't out of any innate sence of moral superiority. Kakashi-sensei simply hated most things. The act of the tasteless buffoon that would gladly defend anything on sale with a five-star rating fooled none of us.

I ambled over to Choji and asked if he was okay. "No worse off than you guys," he replied. "That was really something, huh? Got a – got an S-rank kill on my resume now." He chuckled weakly. "What are we going to do, Shikamaru?"

I swallowed. "Ino's father died to get Gaara back to Konoha. Whatever happens, we can't let his efforts be for nothing. If word gets out that he lost control after all Inoichi did for him, who knows where they'll reassign him to? He's only our age."

"They might stick him in a more severe ANBU program," Choji realized. "Which might make him more unstable, or worse."

"Yeah. And to make matters worse, you know that mission we were coming home from? We were at the C5 Economic Conference – and the Daimyo of all the nations were there _except_ Wind. Because he, and both his sons, are dead; his younger brother holds the title now, and he just named Gaara's significantly more aggressive sister, Temari – I'm not exaggerating; yes, she is more aggressive than he is – the newest Kazekage. Probably because she killed them."

"What. Where is she now? Is she gonna come after us?"

"No idea. Her main body of support is made up of warhawks and militants, so why don't you tell me." I ran a hand through my hair. "Look. Gaara only got mad because his first real friend just died. He didn't hurt any of us, his allies; he only went after Hidan and Kakuzu and the Zetsu things. I mean, I'm sure it was scary as fuck, but so is watching any random Jonin in action, right? So – I don't know – do you think you can convince Asuma-sensei and Hinata and Sasuke to pretend that – you know. Nothing happened. Nothing out of the ordinary, I mean."

"…Naruto had a little…thing…episode…too, right?" Choji asked.

See, this was what I liked about Choji. You didn't have to say the whole sentence out loud for him to understand what you were getting at.

"Just a tiny one, because, again, unanticipated intruders showed up and he thought we died. And it wasn't even that bad; we're all still here, right?" I grabbed Choji's shoulders. "Please. I'm begging you. We _can't_ let anyone get a whiff of this. They could use it to go, 'See, the Yamanaka clan techniques can't be _that_ good, because look at what a sucky job they did on this kid; let _me_ take control, and I'll do better,' and they'll _definitely_ make him way, way worse."

Choji understood well enough to finish my thoughts for me. "And Ino's father won't even be alive to defend himself. Meanwhile, Ino's family won't be able to do anything about it, because they're going to be busy planning the funeral and getting her caught up with the duties of a clan head. So they'll just be forced to sit there while they lose face."

"Exactly."

"I'm with you on this. I'm pretty sure I can get Sasuke and Hinata on board pretty easily, too. They totally get what it's like, on a personal level, to get beaten down so far you can't stand it anymore. But I'm not sure about Asuma-sensei. He might not want to lie to his dad…"

"It's not lying. It's, uh, conveniently being unable to recall…Maybe I'll ask Kakashi-sensei. They're from the same generation-ish; they should be able to talk to each other more easily." Secrets were a currency of their own, and I had bought and traded plenty, both for Ino's gossip column and for my own purposes. Nothing in Tanyu was ever a secret, and what happened there only stayed there as long as you had enough insurance for mutually assured destruction.

It was thanks to those misadventures with the Butterfly, that I now had a sufficient number of backup plans, the least of which involved just exactly what the man had been up to without the Sandaime's knowledge while he was one of the Twelve Guardian Ninja. None of which I hoped I would have to end up using, so I prayed to the heavens and back that Kakashi-sensei would be able to simply convince Asuma-sensei without any of that.

It left a poisonous feeling in my gut, even considering blackmailing a fellow Konoha nin, but what else could I possibly do? This was Ino's family name at stake; our families had been allied for generations before Konoha was even an idea in the Shodaime's head.

Luckily, that did not come to pass. Asuma-sensei had already been considering keeping quiet before this, and playing the sympathy card for both Gaara and Ino worked surprisingly well. As we stood giving our cropped reports in the Hokage's office, there was also the niggling thought in the back of my head that maybe, just maybe, this was Asuma-sensei's tiny bit of rebellion against the Sandaime, that perhaps their feud from all those years ago hadn't been entirely resolved after all.

Not that I was going to risk alienating him by asking. We were unbelievably lucky, that the only other team in the area alive to witness Gaara's little meltdown had been Team 10, and that Team 10 had been willing to cooperate with my little plan. It could have very well been a no-name group with no connection to us at all and would gladly report to whatever superior asked. Perhaps this was fortune's way of making up for all our missions turning out so shitty. Take a little luck away here, give a little luck back there. Of course, we wouldn't have needed it in the first place, if the Akatsuki hadn't attacked.

"Dude, you guys look like someone sent you through meat grinder. What the heck happened?"

That voice was familiar. I turned around. "Good to see you too, Izumo. And I daresay you'll hear on the grapevine soon enough."

His new rank seemed to suit him well; last I heard, he already had a few good A-ranks under his belt. I prayed my recommendation hadn't been a mistake. Of course, since he _was_ promoted, that was on Konoha and not on me.

"Oh, come on, I don't want to wait that long when I have the source right here! Let me be the root of the grapevine for once!"

"Guess so. I mean, think of the paperwork this will generate, huh? Bet you're really appreciating the rank upgrade now!"

Izumo and I shared a laugh, but it was awkward and dead. It was kind of hard to miss the body bags. And the injuries.

"Listen," I said, "I know this is way below your pay grade, but can you deliver a message for me? Just to the guys in the office. They know me, don't worry." I'd cozied up to the replacements as much as I could after Izumo had left for more elevated pastures.

"Uh, sure."

"Good. You see that kid, Gaara, that we just brought in? I need you to schedule an appointment for a full psych eval for him as soon as possible. Get Ibiki and Santa Yamanaka in on it; if they both agree then no one can dispute their verdict. And if you see a different request for a psych eval that _doesn't_ involve those two, _do not_ by _any means_ process it." I refused to believe that the timid, crying boy in front of me was irredeemably violent, and I was not going to let anyone ruin Ino's father's hard work by saying otherwise. "And officially approve guardianship claims for him under either Jiraiya or Yamato. No one else. Understand? _No one else._ "

Izumo blinked. "Uh, sure, but why not Inoichi…" his eyes fell on Ino and the body bag. "Oh. _Oh._ That was – Fuck. Um. This isn't going to be pretty, is it?"

"No," I said. "Not at all."

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

They had been so close.

 _So. Damn. Close._

Shikaku stared morosely at the ANBU reports of the Uchiha massacre. The ones that Inoichi had worked so painstakingly hard to get. The ones that Inoichi had been planning to investigate further when he came back.

Gone. Disappeared in the last breath that Inoichi had taken like a gust of wind. There was only so much the others could do. Ibiki was the highest-ranked of his remaining allies within ANBU intelligence, and the clearance level he had to the rest of their records was significantly lower than Inoichi's.

There was a knock at his door, accompanied with a coded spark of chakra. Shikamaru was home. No doubt with full knowledge of the same bad news, seeing as he had been there in person.

"Was it fast, at least?" Shikaku asked.

"It couldn't have taken more than a few minutes," Shikamaru shrugged. "Between him calling us for help, and him already being dead for awhile when we finally found him."

"Good enough." If Inoichi had suffered, then he hadn't suffered for long. "How is Ino?"

"Not good."

Suboptimal, but as expected. "And you?"

"I'm okay."

Shikaku raised an eyebrow. "Oh, really?"

"Yeah."

It would have been more convincing if his son's voice hadn't cracked near the end of that answer. Shikaku knew the difference between puberty and pain, even if teenagers worldwide swore they were the same thing. Even without having to ask what exactly happened during that mission, he recognized the look in his son's eyes. The same look he'd had after…

"I take it water was involved somehow."

Shikamaru's wince was all the confirmation he needed.

"I'm not going to force you to go to therapy, or otherwise impose my own idea of treatment upon you," Shikaku said. "I think you are smart enough on your own to realize that letting something like this continue to go on will likely end up with you dead in the field. Figure out for yourself how you can fix things."

Shikamaru nodded meekly.

"Good. If you ever need my help, of course, I will – "

"What about Ino?" Shikamaru quickly changed the subject.

Shikaku narrowed his eyes. "We will, of course, help the Yamanaka, as they have helped us in the past − "

"Don't play dumb, dad; we know each other too well for that. Ino's father died for a reason. My question is, is the reason exactly as I saw it when my team failed to save him, or was it due to something else? Something which you seem to know more about than me, despite not being there at all?" Shikamaru suddenly demanded.

Shikaku froze. Then, he closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths. He opened his mouth, intending to respond, and then, after some internal debate, decided to reach into the bottom drawer of his desk and pull out some sake instead. "And what makes you think that?"

"After the whole Chunin Exam debacle, you said you'd allow me to stay more involved, but I'd have to be an idiot to think you'd tell me everything. For _years_ you and Ino's father and who knows how many other clan heads have been plotting behind the Hokage's back. All because of this one random retired war veteran whom no one has seen in years, a man I had to dig through four generations' worth of files to even get a name on. And now Inoichi Yamanaka is _dead_." Shikamaru accused.

It was a perfectly reasonable explanation, mixed with enough truth to make it believable, which probably meant it was a lie, then, to hide his true sources. Shikaku doubted his son, no matter how talented, could have gleaned all that from snooping just by himself. But of course Shikaku could never prove it. Shikamaru was too good at what he did for that.

"How about this," said Shikaku, wondering when his son had become an _adult_. "You come clean to me, honestly, about everything you've been up to, and I'll come clean to you, about everything I've been up to."

"That's never going to happen and you know it."

"Fine. One for one. Quid pro quo. You tell me something of yours, and in exchange I tell you something of mine for equal value."

"You go first."

"A game of shogi. Winner gets to go second. Sound fair?" He shouldn't have _had_ to be doing this. This trading of information, as if they were two foreign nin wanting to collaborate with each other but being afraid of either one betraying the other. They were _father_ and _son_ ; this sort of information exchange should have been natural, no strings attached.

Shikamaru looked so sad. Shikaku imagined he must have had the same look on his face as well. This was…well, it was his fault; he started it first, all the secrecy and lies. If only he had just come clean with Shikamaru before, maybe his son would be more open to sharing with him. Now, regaining one another's mutual trust would be a steep uphill climb.

"Should we be doing this? Just next door, our allies for the past sixteen generations are falling apart, and here we are, deciding fate with a board game."

Shikaku looked at the dark rings underneath his son's eyes. They were similar to his own, and he'd been working on them for decades. That, more than anything, hit him right in the heart. His son was still just a kid (much as he liked to pretend otherwise). He shouldn't have to be carrying so many weights at this point in time. When Shikaku was at that age, he was sleeping in until noon and figuring out how to avoid Yoshino –

Well, that hadn't changed, but the point was, Shikamaru's talent and drive were being _punished_ instead of rewarded, and that was most unfair.

"Yeah, forget that," he muttered, reaching for the copy of Inoichi's report. "Here. Take it. It's all yours. You don't need to tell me anything you've been doing on the side. Just – "

At the same time, Shikamaru blurted out, "That whole period of time I couldn't train. I was bored as hell. I needed something to do, and my team had just gotten hurt. I didn't want to be a sitting duck again. I set up a personal network and it's been running since, from here to Tanyu to anywhere Ino's gossip magazine sells, which is everywhere." He sighed.

"But stuff like the Akatsuki, or Danzo…" Shikaku prompted.

"The readings I get from Jonin bar gossip is hazy at best, concerning those terrorists only have about ten people in their organization while most people don't even remember anyone from the Hokage's generation apart from the Hokage himself." Shikamaru looked up at him pleadingly. "But if we share what we each have, then we'll both do better. _Please_ , dad. Ino's a clan head now. Plausible deniability won't save me, or Ino, or Naruto anymore. We are all in danger; you cannot expect to shield us forever. You cannot let me turn weak; the best way to protect me is to teach me how to protect _myself_ – "

"Protect _yourself_ , or go running into more danger because – "

"If I do not seek out the danger the danger will come to me. At least, in this way, _I_ know exactly what I am dealing with. Both from their side…and from you. I can be helpful, dad. I promise."

"You were just a child," Shikaku explained. "You were barely in the Academy, and yet you displayed so much potential. Danzo Shimura wanted _you_ , Shikamaru, just like he wanted Fuu Yamanaka and Shino Aburame – "

Shikamaru blinked. "…I always suspected you were a part of this whole mess, but I had no idea how far your web extended."

"I could say the same for you." Anyone with limited time and resources to go after a specific demographic of allies would naturally gear towards the major power blocs, as he and Danzo both knew. Why court the average soldier who knew nothing about the plots dictating their lives when they could instead gain the power of the clans? In comparison, the ordinary – the grunts – the painfully average administrative pencil pusher Chunin every village had an abundant supply of, to do the work that would have otherwise fallen into civilian hands simply because of clearance level – were the dregs at the bottom of the barrel.

Shikamaru had taken these overlooked and forgotten and entirely unimportant individuals because, as a twelve-year-old kid playing a game meant for adults, they were the only leftover demographic available.

To men who already had the power and clearance Danzo and Shikaku had, they were pretty useless. To a kid constantly left out of the loop like Shikamaru, such an insane amount of control over Konoha's bureaucracy was a good start.

What he had gained since that "good start", on the other hand, was far beyond useless.

Shikaku only felt fortunate that his son was on his side. Somehow, he didn't like the feeling of being dependent on this brand of luck at all.


	58. The Unwelcome Homecoming

**A/N: Holy crap, I am so sorry you guys. This is the longest I've probably gone without an update. Was dealing with a few medical issues that kept coming back over the past month. I think I'm ok now, though, so we'll see.**

* * *

 _The Nara Clan Compound_

I let go of my anger. I could never stay mad at my father for long. It wasn't a matter of whether or not anyone deserved it, but a matter of practicality. Anger was counterproductive to proper thinking and planning. I couldn't very well march up to Danzo Shimura, or the Hokage, or whoever else was orchestrating this and call them out on it, could I?

"Really, though?" I asked. " _Shino?_ "

"Yes, him. He didn't go; they took his cousin instead. Torune Aburame. For 'secret training', which meant even if we found him again they would not be ours, but Danzo Shimura's. How could I watch you become the same thing? How could I sit back and let such things happen to you? I was but a young man then, a new father. I wanted to do all I could to protect my family. I still do. The moment he set his sights on you I had no choice but to make him my enemy, not that he could have ever been my friend."

"How many?"

"Hm?"

"You mentioned Shibi Aburame. Who else is involved in this? Clearly, Ino's father was. I'm guessing Choji's father, too." I pointed to the Uchiha report. "Who else did you rope into this little scheme of yours?"

"Tsume Inuzuka. Hopefully, Hiashi Hyuga – "

I drew in a breath. "Is _every_ clan in Konoha – "

"That was my goal, yes." I could see why. The balance of powers in Konoha was a very delicate one. The Hokage held the position of top command, of course. But the clans also had substantial leverage, even the ones that were near extinction like the Senju or Uchiha. And, of course, the Hokage answered to the Daimyo. Danzo Shimura…he was the fourth bar in a rickety triangle, a powerful force that seemed necessary but really shouldn't have been there in the first place.

"So that's it, then?" I asked quietly. "Everything we tried to do, all the lies and the going behind people's backs, and it still wasn't enough right when we needed it most?"

My father shook his head and offered up the Uchiha papers again. "Just read it."

"These were the last thing Inoichi gave to you before he died?" I asked, and he nodded. "You know, before this, my two major suspects were the Akatsuki working independently – they had a member capable of fast intel collection – or Gaara's older sister."

"Ah, yes. Temari is proving herself to be an extremely aggressive Kazekage, so I've heard." My father smiled. Again, thank the heavens that I had made the appropriate prayers for the paperwork gods' blessings. "Sadly, that means the regular rules when dealing with her are completely out the window."

* * *

 _Konoha_

For all those weeks leading up to his move to Konoha, Gaara had spent his nights dreaming of all the things he'd get to do once he finally arrived. Making friends, meeting people who didn't hate him, finding more things to do…he had gotten his hopes up so high. Konoha was supposed to be sunny and happy and perfect, and he was supposed to live with Inoichi's family and spend his days making friends and meeting lots of people who didn't hate him and didn't know he was a monster and _Inoichi's daughter and her team SAW him, saw him for who he was, and oh gods she probably hated him now because Inoichi died to protect him and she probably thought that he killed Inoichi because that was what Gaara did he killed things and he let Inoichi down_.

He wasn't even with Inoichi's family. They had transferred him to a different place. It was a nice place, cozy, more lived-in than the cells he came from before. An old man named Jiraiya sometimes checked up on him. Jiraiya liked to drink a lot. He also talked about women in ways that Gaara was still having trouble understanding.

Apart from that, Gaara didn't see very many people. Ibiki came over to visit sometimes. Gaara liked that. Ibiki was the only one he really knew in this place. There was that other guy, Santa, who sort of looked Inoichi, but with red hair. He said that Gaara was fine, and that he wouldn't have to go through much therapy again unless he wanted to.

Gaara didn't know how true that was. He had relapsed _really badly_ when he saw Inoichi – die – he couldn't help it; it had been too much. Gaara wondered if they were going to have to start over again, the whole therapy thing, and then he wondered _how_ were they going to do that, now that Inoichi was _gone_?

It took him days to finally summon up the courage to ask. "Are they…all right?"

Ibiki tapped the back of his pencil on some papers. "Ino Yamanaka is busy getting her affairs in order. She is the new clan head of the Yamanaka now. Her team is…assisting her through these hard times. Don't worry; they haven't forgotten you."

Gaara's stomach dropped, but he swallowed down the disappointment. It was to be expected. He didn't dare intrude. They had known each other for longer, so of course they were more important. It hurt, though. Inoichi talked about his family a lot, and Gaara loved listening. They were supposed to be full of chatter and life, just as Inoichi had been (which fascinated Gaara, the idea of a family that was always communicating with each other), not shrouded in loss. If he was in their position he probably wouldn't want to look at his face either.

This was supposed to be a second chance, a fresh start for him, and instead he went and totally blew it. He wanted so badly to talk to them, but he didn't think he could face their definite rejection, because by now probably everyone knew what a monster he was.

"And the others?"

"The other team that was there, Team Asuma – their Jonin leader is the son of the Hokage, and the other members are all heirs to three of Konoha's Great Four clans," Ibiki explained. "With the added disguises and cover story we've prepared for you, you needn't worry about your secret getting out. As far as anyone on the street is concerned, you're…"

Ibiki trailed off. Gaara started and realized that this was a prompt. "I'm an orphan who grew up in a place bordering Fire Country," he recited. "My mother died, and I never really saw my father after I was born, nor did she – many shinobi, specifically Konoha shinobi, pass through our town, and she – well, the Hokage has kindly allowed me to stay here."

"Just like all the others."

"Just like all the others," Gaara repeated. War babies were common enough that no one would care to look at them more than twice. The fact that nothing in his cover story was technically a lie (though the placement of each sentence was purposefully designed to mislead) also helped.

Ibiki smiled. "See, you've got the hang of this. No one will know you're a jinchuuriki apart from those people, and they can be trusted to keep quiet."

He scratched at his face. He looked different with fake eyebrows and his tattoo missing and his hair dyed a dull brown. It was uncomfortable, but necessary, because his mere existence could cause a violent uproar, possibly war. "So I just lie to people then?" Gaara asked sadly.

"Just think of it as omitting some details. Everyone does it. There's no crime in keeping your personal life personal."

Jiraiya sometimes took him to the hospital to visit another lady named Tsunade. When he practiced those lines on the nurses passing in and out of the waiting room, they at least regarded him with the same politeness one would give to a strange foreign entity. None of them went out of their way to befriend him as Inoichi had. Perhaps it was because they were so caught up in recent events that they had no time to spare him any excess thought, or maybe it was because Inoichi was the special one among them. He had no idea. At this point, the best he could hope for was vague comradery, business partners bound under the same company that was the Konohagakure no Sato.

Konoha. What was he, here? Did he even belong? Inoichi had assured him that it would be more welcoming than Suna, and true, they did not revile him – yet − but only because they had no idea what he had done. Surely, if the truth came out, they would turn their backs on him.

Within himself he still felt lost. He was a strange foreigner to them; he had only been here once before for a particularly disastrous set of Chunin exams. He doubted any of them even remembered him, as he had never competed – or otherwise bothered – to interact in public.

He loved Konoha, wanted to be _one of them_ , and yet he could not, for no matter how hard he tried there were just parts of the culture that he did not understand. A childhood, if you could call it that, surrounded by dry air and sand dunes was too ill-fitted to the strange references, the childhood games, the inside jokes and slang, the popular ideas that floated around like second nature to these people.

Or maybe it was his personal problem. There were other immigrants here, foreigners who had been born and raised somewhere else and then moved here to settle for work and business reasons or some such. Those people had assimilated perfectly fine.

It was his own problem; he was sure of that. All his life he had approached people only to have them drive him away, and now that he was no longer being chased away from everything he was the one – how painfully ironic – causing hisown isolation. And now there was no Inoichi to help him walk through anything.

"Do I have to lie to – Inoichi's daughter, and her friends, too? How long am I going to stay here? How can we be certain that I'm not going to lose control again? Because I _don't want to_ lose control. I don't! I want to be good, but I _don't know how_ , and you're putting yourself in danger just by being in the same room as me − "

His heart pounded. He couldn't breathe. It was like an elephant was sitting on him. The room spun. Gaara grabbed the tiny wastebasket by Ibiki's desk and, humiliatingly, vomited right on top of all the paper.

He fully expected Ibiki to be angry at him, but Ibiki only placed a hand on the back of his head and rubbed circles into his back as he emptied his stomach. When he was done, there was a glass of water already waiting for him. Gaara blinked in confusion, fully expecting the joke to be over, but Ibiki never said a word.

"Thank you," he said, like Inoichi had taught him.

"Listen, Gaara," said Ibiki. "Inoichi and I have worked together for many years, and I have the utmost respect for him. I am trained as an interrogator, the darker side of psychology, if you will. But that doesn't mean I learned nothing from him. He's a good man."

Gaara sniffled. "I'm sorry for ruining your trash can. I'll clean it out myself, I promise – "

"Don't worry about it. It's just a trash can. Look," Ibiki knelt down and looked him in the eye, "Anxiety is a bitch. I know from personal experience. You've seen underneath the bandana, right? I walk around with those scars like it's nothing, but trust me, that whole month after I was extracted from that torture cell, I was a wreck. I still get problems about that sometimes. And I learned that a lot of the time, the very thing that started those panic attacks, was thinking about them in the first place."

"But how do I – "

"Slow down, Gaara. One question at a time. First of all, you don't have to lie to any of the people that were there. They're smart enough not to say anything. And secondly, we'll be putting you through a special training programs with another one of our operatives. Yamato – you know Yamato? I think he's seen you in passing before – will be helping you control your tailed beast. He's already done a great deal helping our native Konoha jinchuuriki with great success. We will provide you the resources to help yourself, Gaara. You needn't worry."

"And what about the men that were – you know, the ones with the funny cloaks."

"Those bad men that killed Inoichi," Ibiki told him, "are on the lookout for people like you. Jinchuuriki, see. They've already hurt everyone else. You're one of the last ones left."

Gaara gulped. "What do you mean, one of the last ones?"

"Well, there's you. And then the Eight-Tails and Two-Tails are in Kumogakure's possession, we believe, though Yugito Nii has recently dropped off the map, so even her status is dubious. You're powerful, Gaara, and people want that power for their own use."

That was a big fat lie. If he had been so powerful, then why was Inoichi dead? "And who else knows about my 'power' now?" he asked. "I messed up so bad back there. I lost control. I was a monster. A big fat horrible − "

"You're not a monster," Ibiki said flatly. "Unless Inoichi Yamanaka was lying. Or an idiot. Are you calling Inoichi Yamanaka a liar or an idiot?"

"No! Of course not!"

"You killed _trees_ , Gaara," said Ibiki, "and you helped kill people who were trying to kill you."

But killing was bad, so he wouldn't do it anymore. At least, killing outside of orders. Inoichi had told him that if the order was given, then it was okay. Now Inoichi was dead; how was he supposed to know who was okay to kill and who wasn't? Could he trust Ibiki? Maybe. And Inoichi's daughter? Inoichi thought highly of her. He said good things about the Hokage, too, but he didn't talk about the Hokage as much as he talked about his family.

The guy could talk. A lot.

"I lost control. If the others hadn't been busy trying to stop me they could have – " Maybe if he had learned to control Shukaku like he was supposed to – then maybe the Kazekage would have liked him better. Maybe Sunagakure would have liked him better. Maybe Baki wouldn't have given him away.

"I hate to say it, Gaara, but Inoichi was dead before they even arrived. Whatever you did was an inconvenience, true, but it had no bearing on Inoichi's fate. There was nothing you could have done to help, which sounds bad, but at the same time there was nothing you did that severely hurt us, either." Ibiki shrugged.

"But I wasn't good at all."

"Why don't we work on not being bad, first," said Ibiki, "and then we'll go from there."

Gaara nodded. He decided that, in Inoichi's absence, he would like Ibiki instead. When growing up in Sunagakure, he'd heard horror stories about this man, how he was a specialist in torture and interrogation. But the Ibiki he knew was a man who had lost the same friend Gaara had, who taught him how to breathe and count every time he got nervous, and gave him warm milk before he went to bed.

Those other stories about this man being able to make even the most nightmarish murderous monsters of the world bend and bow to his every whim must have been total lies, he decided.

"Gaara, can you get me that pen, please?"

Gaara picked it up and handed it to him. It was the least he could do.

* * *

 _The Yamanaka Clan Compound_

Inhale.

"Time to get up, Ino."

Exhale.

"Time to meet with your team, Ino."

Inhale.

"Time to eat, Ino."

Exhale.

"Time to talk to some people you don't care about, Ino."

Inhale.

"Time to sleep, Ino."

Exhale.

Inhale.

Exhale.

In−

 _WHY WAS THIS HAPPENING?_

It wasn't fair. It wasn't fair it wasn't fair _IT WAS NOT FAIR!_

WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE HER FATHER? WHY DID IT HAVE TO BE HER? WHO WERE THESE GODS OF DEATH, WHO HAD THE RIGHT TO TAKE HER FATHER FROM HER?

Ino caught a glimpse of her own face in her mirror. The big ugly pink scar crisscrossed across her forehead and cheeks, like a spiderweb of cracks across old china plates, like a bolt of lightning splitting the sky in half.

She looked at her reflection. She was disgusted by it. It was hideous, her electrical burns. She hated her face. She hated herself, for being too slow to do anything. She hated those men, for killing her father. She hated her father, for leaving her. She hated everyone who stopped by and delivered those empty, socially expected words of condolences, and then carried on as normal moments later. She hated her own family, standing around and whispering _how are we going to manage the leadership now, she's fourteen_ behind her back as if she couldn't hear them.

Did the gods like to play stupid games with them?

Was she being punished?

(Because if that was the case, then she was so, so sorry. She really was.)

She thought of all those people whose deaths she had ordered. Names, personalities, identities she had deleted off the face of the earth and then afterwards _justified_ like it was some sort of game. And now she was getting a taste of her own medicine, showing on the surface exactly what sort of disgusting murdering liar she was on the inside, feeling _death_ close and personal, striking straight home, and _by the gods_ it was so much harder to accept when it was something close to her.

All those nameless faceless men everywhere, she'd forgotten as soon as they had gone –

 _(Remember where you come from, Ino. You are a Yamanaka. You are a guardian of the minds of men, a keeper of their souls, for in this world where bodies might rot and wither the mind is all there is. The moment you forget that – the moment you dismiss the value of even one man's consciousness – is the moment you lose your own. And then the gods will laugh and strike you down to earth again, for if there is one thing they like to do, it is remind a mortal exactly where he comes from.)_

– but this one would be burned into her mind forever.

Without thinking, she drew back her hand and punched her reflection as hard as she could. The mirror smashed to pieces, shards going into her knuckles and cutting open her palms. This was all normal, right? She knew Kakashi-sensei did it all the time, showing up to team meetings with bruised knuckles instead of glassy ones, probably because after some point he'd stopped buying mirrors and learned to shave by kunai-point…

Seven more years of bad luck, and counting, except that Team 7's terrible luck would probably still be terrible regardless of superstition. Broken mirrors and dead albatrosses, it would all be the same either way. She didn't care. She wanted it to end.

"Here," Naruto said, holding out a roll of bandage tape.

"Go away."

Naruto looked at her. And then he took a step forward.

"No."

"Naruto. Get out now."

"I said no."

Ino glared at him in silence. Naruto stared back, unwavering.

"Whatever," she muttered listlessly, but she placed her hand in his palms.

"It's unbearable, isn't it? The feeling of being alone in the world. Floating like a cork on water, an unanchored ship at sea. Not having anyone. Being lost, and lonely. Seeing someone you thought would always be there for you, someone you never imagined leaving, suddenly disappearing into the shadows, just like that. Gone, just like that." Naruto twiddled this thumbs. "I can't remember my parents, but…I get what it feels like, not knowing what the next day would bring. Vanishing unnoticed into thin air like a nameless nobody without having made a memorable mark on the world, with no one to mourn my passing or remember my name after six months."

"I hate it," Ino bawled. "I hate not being able to do anything. If we'd just been faster – I killed so many people and I didn't even care about them and look at me falling apart when _one_ person I know dies. I can't – I can't do this − "

"You can," Naruto whispered. "You're the strongest person I know. You saved me from myself; it's time I did the same for you."

Ino shook her head. "Shut up…"

Naruto kept speaking, his words like magic, and she had never known he could be so eloquent verbally, given his atrocious syntax and grammar on paper. But he could do it, and she was hearing his skill now.

"For what it's worth, Ino, I still think you're beautiful. And, yeah, I know you still think of me as a younger brother. I don't mind. Having brothers and sisters, I mean. But we've all got to look out for each other, and now is no exception. Come back to us, Ino. I know you're strong enough to get over this yourself. It'll be faster and easier and less painful if you don't do it alone. You're not being punished. You haven't done anything wrong. We've said it before and we'll say it again: it is _not your fault_. It's no one's fault, but the men who took it upon themselves to hurt other people. To hurt and kill your father, and his teammates.

"You still being here isn't a punishment. It's a mark of survival, Ino. You're still here, fighting for what you believed in. Protecting your friends. When you went out with us that night, you weren't thinking of sins and good deeds. You weren't thinking of beauty and ugliness, whether it was on the inside or outside. You were simply doing your duty. Responding to a call of help from a fellow team from Konoha."

Ino felt the tears come back.

But they no longer stung.

"And even if you hate yourself now, it's not going to matter to the rest of us. The reason why you were so popular wasn't just because of looks. Your personality – so outgoing, confident, and thoughtful. You knew exactly what people liked and wanted to see just from looking at them. People liked you for you – and that won't change just because of a scar. You're as beautiful as you make yourself, Ino, and that will never go away as long as your strength remains.

"Your father was a wonderful man, and it's okay to feel sad. We've killed and hurt, and it's okay to feel guilty. You – "

"God, shut up, Naruto," Ino whispered, crying. "Stop being such a motivational little brat. You're driving me insane with your – amazing speeches, and magical therapy and – "

Naruto gave her a hug.

 _God_ , she needed that.

"I'm sorry, guys. I'm sorry for holing myself up and snapping at everyone who was trying to help me. Thank you. Thank you for not giving up on me," she whispered.

"No. It's okay. We're all here for you," Shikamaru said. "Sometimes, life sucks, and when it does it's totally fine to tell life exactly what you think of it."

Ino giggled and wiped her nose. "Seriously, though. Now I feel stupid. For reacting so – man, I was like a train wreck, wasn't I?"

"You did keep me up at night," Shikamaru admitted. "I can decode complicated seals, but I was so worried about you, I…didn't know what to do."

Ino grinned. "Finally, I've managed to stump the great Shikamaru. With tears and scars. Thank god we have Naruto, right?"

Naruto grinned.

"You've stumped me before," Shikamaru reminded her. "Remember that time when we were really little, and you _tried_ to take me shopping, and I had no idea what was going on?"

"Oh, yeah. That." Ino snorted. "I kept asking you about different colors of dresses and makeup, and you kept _ignoring_ me because you wanted to read your book."

"I only did that because I didn't have a clue what to say but didn't want to look dumb."

"I eventually found out you were dumb in that area anyway."

"Still am," Shikamaru shrugged. Ino let a tiny smile crawl onto her face. "It's okay, though. We all know sensei is the most fashionably stunted member of our team."

"I resent that," Kakashi-sensei, who had been about as vocal as a lawn ornament during the whole affair, suddenly protested. "And besides, I have gotten nothing but good reviews about my kimono collection."

Shikamaru blanched. "Can we please not talk about that?"

Ino laughed quietly. "I couldn't stand it, you know," she admitted. "My father dying, that was bad enough. But what made it worse was the whispers, people treating me like a piece of glass. It only made me feel even more useless and horrible, and – it was a vicious cycle."

 _"Excuse me,"_ she heard her mother in the hallway. _"I am going to have to ask you to please step this way – these are Ino's quarters, not yours – "_

An unfamiliar man replied, _"The very fact that you are unwilling to let me pay my respects to her face proves my point exactly. She needs time to rest and heal."_

"That, see," Ino whispered. "They – "

"They said those things?" Shikamaru hissed, disgusted.

"Never that directly before." Ino hastily wiped at her eyes as she tried to make herself look presentable as the pieces connected in her brain. "But my family – we're a small and close-knit clan; they wouldn't – they _can't_ – "

 _"What are you talking about?"_ her mother snapped.

The man responded, _"She is barely a fourteen-year-old girl, a Genin besides; it would be cruel to add on the stress of running a clan when her father died in the same battle she fought in not a week ago."_

"This is bad, isn't it?" Naruto interrupted. "I don't know jack shit about this stuff, but from the look on Shikamaru's face…"

"There is no way he's trying to be sympathetic," Shikamaru muttered. "This is a classic way to make Ino lose face, taking advantage of her mourning period, age, and rank to 'prove' that she is too naïve, young, and weak to be an effective leader for the clan. Even if her family members are loyal, he can still subvert her authority in front of the other clan heads. You can bet a guy like Hiashi Hyuga wouldn't care who's who − "

 _"Among ourselves, we as adults are capable enough to take care of things in her stead until she comes of age."_

"There, exactly," Shikamaru finished.

"But who − ?" Ino wondered aloud. "I don't recognize that voice; I've never heard it before – No one I know would do that to my father or me − "

"Ah, Ino." A young redheaded man strode into her room without knocking. "I don't believe you remember me. The last time we met, you were a baby. Allow me to reintroduce myself. I am your cousin Fuu Yamanaka, and, as you are currently childless, your legal heir."


End file.
